


Whispers in the Air

by SnowF



Series: For reasons wretched and divine [3]
Category: A Song of Ice and Fire & Related Fandoms, A Song of Ice and Fire - George R. R. Martin, Game of Thrones (TV)
Genre: (nothing's resolved), AU of an AU, Age Difference, Ambiguous Relationships, Book & Show verse, Emotional Baggage, Emotional Manipulation, F/M, Graphic Description, Intrigue, Morally Ambiguous Character, Multi, Non-Canon Relationship, Non-Canonical Character Death, Not Canon Compliant, OC, Political Alliances, Political Parties, Scheming, Targaryen Restoration, Unresolved Emotional Tension, Unresolved Romantic Tension, Unresolved Sexual Tension, War
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2021-01-10
Updated: 2021-03-07
Packaged: 2021-03-14 08:49:28
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Major Character Death
Chapters: 9
Words: 41,034
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28668009
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/SnowF/pseuds/SnowF
Summary: "What a mess we made. Was it worth it?- Every single second was worth it."***Victory can only last so long, in a world like this one. When voices start whispering of the dragon queen's return to Westeros, it no longer matters that the second Dance of the Dragons has just ended and it no longer matters that the war against the dead is only one year away: the shadowed king and queen of Westeros are now preys.Shara Lannister, née Arryn, knows that the time will soon come to make a choice, the only choice that ever mattered; life at all cost or death. The cost is clear, but one question remains.Who is she willing to sacrifice to pay that price?***[Second part to King by Fear and Fables, AU of Birds of a Feather. Reading KFF is advised, as well as the first eight chapters of BoaF]
Relationships: Doran Martell/Original Female Character(s), Garlan Tyrell/Original Female Character(s), Jaime Lannister/Original Female Character(s), Tywin Lannister/Original Female Character(s)
Series: For reasons wretched and divine [3]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1367998
Comments: 22
Kudos: 39





	1. What's won is won...

**Author's Note:**

  * Inspired by [King by Fear and Fables](https://archiveofourown.org/works/19148680) by [SnowF](https://archiveofourown.org/users/SnowF/pseuds/SnowF). 



> As promised, the second part to King by Fear and Fables! Somewhat surprisingly, and everyone who followed the development of KFF have probably started to understand it, what was supposed to be an AU has turned into my favourite version of the Shara Arryn saga... So the second part of that AU is the first to come out. Oh well.
> 
> ***
> 
> For those of you who read KFF: welcome back! Your presence and heartwarming comments on KFF really drove me to write even when things were hard outside this place (and it did turn hard, didn't it? What a year...). I really hope you will enjoy that second part.
> 
> For those of you who have just stumbled across this: welcome! I advise you to read the first part to this fic to fully understand what is going on, it should be linked as the inspiration of this one and it is part of the same series. In case the 44 chapters (my god) of the original fic scare you, here's a quick summary:
> 
> Shara Arryn, daughter of the late Jon Arryn, was compelled to marry Tywin Lannister after her original plan to help Stannis Baratheon seize power was foiled. Betrayed by Stannis himself after secretly continuing to work in his interests, she eventually allied herself to house Lannister to end the War of the Five Kings in Duskendale. The agreement was simple: she remain married to Tywin Lannister as long as he helped regain control over her lands after Petyr Baelish tried to claim lordship over them, and he allowed her complete freedom in exchange for an heir. After ousting (and executing) Petyr Baelish in the Eyrie, Shara indeed gave birth to twins: Alec and Jon Lannister. While she could have decided to flee the capital when the new arose that two Targaryens had survived in Essos, she decided to stay by Tywin's side... And keep on wearing the shadow crown he offered her.
> 
> ***
> 
> As always, I will update that fic once a week as I'm still in the process of writing it. I hope you'll enjoy what's to come!

Winter was nearing its end, or so the maesters said. The white ravens had not yet left the Citadel, so it was just elaborate guesses and gossips, but she had to admit that the days seemed to last longer. The weather was no less unforgiving, but maybe there were more days of cold sun than harsh snow. _Or perhaps we are all delusional_ , she thought as she looked away from her windows to seal another one of her many daily letters, _rendered mad by winter._

This one was for Dreadfort, where Roose Bolton’s bastard was keeping guard and pretending to be trueborn. Roose _Stark_ ’s bastard, really, since he married the last of the living Stark. He forsook his own name for hers rather easily, though, and Shara could not quite trust a man so eager to abandon his house. Then again, she could hardly trust anyone who lived so close to the Wall after everything that happened there.

But he was their only tie to the North, so she had to bear with him. She had insisted for him and not his degenerate bastard to marry Sansa Stark and he eventually accepted. Roose Bolton was a dangerous man, wicked in his own rights, but he was wise enough not to hurt the last Stark either physically or mentally. There were rumours in King’s Landing about the youngest Stark boy’s demise being his doing – but no one dared spread these rumours north of the Neck. She dismissed them herself.

She placed the letter aside and ran a weary hand across her face. It was only starting to feel like the world was not actually ending, and only now did she realize that these last four years had passed in a blur. So many marriages, alliances, feats happened – and after them, war returned.

In the North, against creatures of death. It was Tywin’s war, one he eventually fought himself. He returned, but most did not. Entire houses were obliterated, left with no man to pass on the name. The nameless Sworn Brothers of the Nightwatch, with their number quadrupled, died as well. Only a third of them remained standing. _Or mostly standing anyway._ She did not know everything about what really happened north of the Wall – truth be told, she probably did not know half of the truth and she never truly asked. She just knew that they mined dragonglass out of Dragonstone’s soil, and she knew that it killed _them_. She just knew that Tywin Lannister returned haunted. That was more than enough.

Her war vanished entirely from all mind but hers. She kept on waging it, hidden in the Tower of the Hand in King’s Landing. She watched over the results from afar, watched Westeros begging for help from Essos in the war against the dead. Her doing, of course, not Tywin’s. She received the Free Cities’ promises of help and she watched their ships carrying men, weapons and food. The rest of Essos?

It remained silent, because their Dragon Queen was fighting her own war against the so-called lost prince Aegon. Essos, everywhere either of them had planted their deadly claws, was drowning in fire and blood. While the war against the dead was fought for a year and a half, the second Dance of the Dragons lasted only a year. No dragon died, this time, but nothing remained of the cities where the losing side dwelt. Astapor and Yunkai were gone, pile of ashes long blown by the wind. Daenerys Targaryen won her war and a new title, this one whispered – _kinslayer._ In her own way, she also became an usurper the day she fed her nephew, prince Rhaegar’s son, to her dragons. Shara smirked at this idea. _Convenient._

She grabbed another sheet of parchment. Tywin and his men had won their battles publicly while she was a silent, shadowed victor. He knew, though, and some had suspicions but she was never celebrated, bathed in glory and eternal gratitude. _Not openly anyway._ The entire realm simply knew that Tywin Lannister only responded to letters sent to his wife, at least those she deemed worthy of being passed on to him. The entire realm answered to Tywin Lannister, but it only ever spoke to Shara Lannister.

She suddenly heard knockings at her door, tearing her away from her thoughts. She frowned but allowed in whoever managed to walk past her guards. It was a squire, who could not be older than six-and-ten. He was pale as death and bowed down so lowly that he almost fell. When she understood that he would not speak without her express allowance, she cleared her throat.

“Well?

\- My Lady, your husband… The Lord Hand’s guest has arrived.

\- The Lord Hand is not expecting any guest,” she frowned. “Who is it?

\- Well he… He said only the Lord Hand knew…

\- Then go seek the Lord Hand, boy.

\- He said he was not to be disturbed during the small Council, my Lady.”

_And this is supposed to become a knight._ The war had taken away many strong boys from houses, leaving them with their youngest children to take their place. This one had never been taught how to behave in court and he was probably never supposed to wear an armour. Maester Rubben was braver than that boy and her toddler sons were cleverer.

Still Tywin had never mentioned any guest, however secret, so this could be either one of two things: a trap or a scheme. The Kinsguard would not have allowed in the Red Keep anyone without a proof of their identity and invitation, so it could only be the latter. It did surprise, her though. Tywin did not inform her of every each of his decisions and kept her absolutely ignorant of many matters, but in doing so he was usually more discreet than that. A secret guest, announced by a clumsy squire while he was working? _The Lion is growing old_ , she thought. _Or the mysterious guest refused to come long enough for him to choose not to tell me._

“I am sure he would want to know about this guest,” she insisted with a cold smile. “Especially as he did not see fit to inform me.

\- Y-Yes my Lady, but the guest…

\- Is he some sort of a monster, for you to shake and stammer that much?

\- He is waiting in the Hand’s apartment, my Lady, I did not…

\- You…” She rose from her seat, taking a deep breath and trying not to throw a book at him. “You allowed an unknown guest to enter the Tower of the Hand, where my children live? Are you short of your wits?”

The boy paled even more and made a few steps toward the door, as if hoping he would dash away from her. He tried to reply but only managed to utter unintelligible gabbling. She brushed it off dryly with a sway of her hand as she took another deep breath. Her guards would have not let an unknown guest enter the Tower of the Hand and walk freely in front of her chambers and her son’s – not without a fight anyway. The man was probably someone they had already seen. The boy was stupid and reckless, but whoever that man was, he was not a direct threat. _Not yet._

She made a few steps toward him and stopped nearby. He was staring at the floor, shivering like a maiden. _Brainless goons,_ she thought bitterly as she gestured him to follow her. She headed out of her bedroom, out of her antechamber and walked through the empty landing to reach Tywin’s door. The guards bowed down quickly and let her in with the squire.

The antechamber was empty. She turned to the boy who cowered even more, but said nothing for fear he might collapse in the doorway. The Hand’s guests were not given access to his bedroom, now that the bedroom was _actually_ a bedroom and not a working place where a bed was installed. Although he never worked there, Tywin received his unimportant guests in the antechamber and only allowed the most prized _or_ noble advisors in his private chamber.

“Go seek the Lord Hand,” she ordered the boy with a glare. “Or if you are too scared, ask one of my guards.”

She did not wait for him to leave, she walked through the antechamber and through the door that led to the bedroom. It was a similar sight. She was given mostly free access to his apartments, except when he was working there. _For that,_ she thought, _I have my own ways._ She closed the door behind her and, before she even looked at the guest, spoke.

“I hope you truly are a guest of the Lord Hand, otherwise you might want to draw your sword now.

\- I am not sure threatening Shara Arryn with a sword would do me any good.”

She froze when she heard the guest’s voice echoing under the high ceilings. _Jaime._ She remained still for a moment before she actually managed to face him. He was standing near the desk, just as still as she was, staring at her. She stared back, unable to speak at first. Her annoyance vanished as soon as she saw him, replaced by a maelstrom of countless emotions. Astonishment, curiosity, shock, anger, joy, a mix of the two very contracting needs to embrace him and knock him down at the same time.

And he almost had not changed. There were more grey streaks in his hair and white hairs in his beard, but he was just the same unbelievably handsome man that he was four years ago. She had not seen him since he came to her room to announce his departure and what happened then was still blurry in her mind. She just knew that she eventually collapsed and almost died in childbed. When she awoke, he was gone to never return.

 _I wrote to him,_ she could not help thinking. _So many letters._ After a year of silence, she wrote a letter to him, secretly. She apologized for some of the things she had done to him, but refused to beg for his forgiveness. He never replied – not more than he replied to the other letters she sent him throughout the year. After a few of them she had understood that he would never, but she kept on sending them, especially during the wars. Tywin was gone, her allies in the Red Keep were few and she needed someone to talk to; even if this someone refused to talk back. He had slowly turned into another of her many ghosts and she had accepted that she would never see him again.

But there he was, in his golden and crimson armour, holding his helmet under his arm, as if he never left. She took a deep breath, trying to clear her mind and made a few steps toward him.

“So you are Tywin’s secret guest,” she slowly said. “And I was wondering why he did not tell me. I suppose the answer is obvious now.

\- I heard that he hardly has any secret for you, these days. I did not think he would decide to make a secret out of me.

\- He probably did because you refused to come.” He scoffed. She rose an eyebrow. “Something funny that I missed?

\- I really do not know whether I am surprised because you know him so well, or because you instantly guessed I refused to come.

\- Having heard nothing from you for four years helped me reach that highly subtle conclusion.”

A shadow passed upon his eyes before he regained his usual careless smirk. She had almost forgotten just how much she hated that smirk. _That mask he wears._ That also had not changed. She looked at him for a few more seconds before she headed for the desk. There were a few parchments scattered there, none of them truly important, but she instinctively regrouped and put them all in the drawer. Whatever the reason of Jaime’s return, it was not enough for her to let him dig his nose into the realm’s affairs. As she closed the drawer, she heard him scoffing again.

“You know that I already read that, do you?

\- Why are you here?” she asked him without a pause. “Why have you suddenly changed your mind about your constant isolation?

\- It was not _sudden_ , your dear husband has been demanding my return for almost half a year already.” She frowned. “So he does keep a few secrets, after all.

\- Then why have you yielded?

\- His last letter was more insistent than the others and he refused to explain himself. I figured I had only one way to know, so I came.”

She kept a straight face, but none of that really helped her. Nothing had happened in court or in the realm since the war was over and although she kept a very close eye on Essos, nothing seemed to happen there either. Tywin had not mentioned anything that could justify his insistence and she knew nothing about the letters he sent to his son. She eyed him as he headed for the window, lost in her thoughts.

“But I suppose we will both need to wait for him for that, will we not?

\- So it seems.

\- By the way,” he said while turning his head to look at her again. “Years seem not to have any hold on you, Shara. You have not changed.

\- And yet I have, but you were not there to see it.

\- Not to see it, but I heard and read it all.” He paused and shook his head, an all-too familiar shadow cast upon his gaze. “And they say Tywin Lannister won the war.

\- He did. Then again, you were not there to see it.”

That was unfair, and she knew it was unwarranted at the very moment she spoke. Without his hand despite his training, he could not fight at the Wall – too dangerous, too unsure considering the danger. He remained at Casterly Rock the entire time, sending troops to reinforce the army and prisoners for the Night’s Watch. People whispered, of course. Ser Jaime Lannister, the crippled knight, aiding in a war he could not wage himself. The former shining star of House Lannister, doing just as much as any other lordling or landed Lady.

“You obviously were there to see it all,” he hissed back, glaring at her. “But since you are so eager to speak of this, tell me, was it really the Fat Flower who governed while my father was at the Wall? Or was it you, speaking through his mouth?

\- I never attended the small Council. The king…

\- Gods, spare me, I am not one of your senseless courtiers. Did he surrender you the entire realm?

\- I had my own war to wage, Jaime. If your father had wanted me to rule, he would not have hidden me.” She paused and shook her head. “Not to say that playing pretend no longer amuses me.

\- Why of course. You are never pretending, obviously. The most truthful woman of Westeros, one everyone know the exactly the motives and character.” He scoffed and chuckled lowly. “How many of your courtiers do you actually fool?”

_All of them_ , she thought. _Except for some of the Tyrells._ Margaery could not be fooled this easily after scheming with her for so long. Her father was daft, but clever enough to listen to his royal daughter. They were drifting away from the crown, the both of them – but her, especially. It was bound to happen. Tommen was older now, no longer a child to be taught or reprimanded; his Hand was getting too powerful, too overwhelming. _Inescapable_ , now that he had saved the realm. House Tyrell was growing impatient and yearned for its time to shine.

As for Margaery, she was tired to be a puppet queen, waving and smiling while others ruled in her name.

 _Can it be the reason why Tywin asked him to return?_ This situation was nowhere near new, it was just festering like an open grave. They had discussed it before he left for the Wall, discussed it again when he returned. They had to find some ways to keep the Tyrells in check, but they had found nothing yet. But she was watching over House Tyrell from afar, knowing full well that they spied back, and they had done nothing to explain Jaime’s return. _Unless Tywin knows things I ignore._

She was going to reply when the door opened – on him. Jaime and her turned but remained still as he closed the door behind him. He said absolutely nothing for a moment, unshaken as if it was not the first time in four years that he saw his son. He slowly made his way to the desk and gestured them to sit in front of him. They complied silently, on the two armchairs that faced his desk. Only then did he shed a glance at his son.

“I trust your journey was good?

\- Eventless is a more proper term.

\- I was expecting a notice from you,” Tywin continued, seemingly detached. “Before you actually knocked on the Red Keep’s door.

\- I was not sure I would not stop at the gates of this cesspool of a capital. I figured it was better not to raise expectations.” He slouched against the back of his armchair. “But here I am.

\- Here you are, indeed.”

Silence resumed. She looked at the two men in turn while they stared back at each other. She could not possibly know for sure what was happening in their head, but she knew what defiance looked like with the Lannisters – and this was defiance. Arrogance, on Jaime’s part. Severity on Tywin’s. She remained silent for as long as they did, patiently. Hiding her frustration and annoyance, now that it had returned. The cruel mix of feelings and emotions Jaime had created in her when she first saw him had subsided.

“The squire you sent,” Tywin eventually said, turning his eyes on her. “Almost fainted at the small Council’s door.

\- Well, tell your knights to choose better squires, or to do their dirty work themselves.

\- How peculiar that the first person he sought was not you,” Jaime hissed again. “But your wife.

\- The squire had been instructed not to disturb the small Council’s session. Given that you forced your way into my chambers, the boy hardly had a choice.

\- Be careful, father, lest someone hears this and starts to think you are getting soft.”

She glanced at Jaime. He was smirking, proud of his wit. Tywin simply did not react, essentially ignoring that his son had even spoken. He rose from his seat to head for his bookcase. Seizing a book, he opened it to reveal that most of the pages had been carved and hollowed in order to create enough space to hide small objects, or pieces of parchment. As he held it open, she recognized the spine – it was a collection of poems, songs and prayers that had belonged to her once. She frowned and began to rise from her seat when he gestured her to remain seated.

“Is it…

\- Yes,” he replied, bringing the book back with him and handing it to her. He kept its content in his hand. “It is yours.

\- I thought you burned this one.

\- I burned the content, not the container.” Jaime was watching them absentmindedly, obviously not aware of what this book was. She kept in on her lap, closed and tightly held in both of her hands. “When have you last received notice from Myrcella, son?

\- Half a year, maybe less, perhaps more. Why?”

Tywin looked at him for a few seconds, as if trying to make sure he was not lying, and handed her the piece of parchment he had hidden in her decoy. She unfolded it. Not much was written there, only a few words hastily inscribed. _The spear has welcomed his true liege. A quiet fire burns just as hard; weddings in all colours are in fashion in Westeros. Red, purple, green, gold and crimson._ Shara read it a few more times before she passed it to Jaime.

Tywin was staring at her when she looked up. His face was unreadable. _How long since he received that?_ It looked like gibberish, but it was the ways of some of his agents; riddles. This one was not particularly complicated to understand. _The spear, the Martells. His, prince Doran. The true liege…_ She closed her eyes for a second as she processed the full meaning of the words.

“Who wrote this?” Jaime asked, sounding unnerved. “Is it Myrcella?

\- Of course not. The girl is so enamoured with her prince that she might as well be called a Martell already.” She opened her eyes again. Tywin was still looking at her. “But it is about her.

\- How credible is it?” she asked. “Does it come from a believable source?

\- It does.

\- Why did you not tell me? If this is about her, I could have…

\- It was too late. This was sent by an agent in Sunspear.”

_From within._ She should have heard from this first – she had hundreds of agents in Essos, everywhere in Essos, spying on the Dragon queen for her, they should have sent her notice of this. _Except if it did not happen in Essos._ She took a deep breath. Her agents were not part of her inner circle, it was too dangerous to try to infiltrate her _small Council_. If the matter had been discussed by one of her advisors, directly in Westeros, and not through ravens or couriers… Her agents had no way to know about it. Especially as she had not heard of any formal alliance with the Martells since the end of the Dance.

Jaime was now looking at the both of them in turn. After a while, he put the parchment back on the desk and slowly ran his hand across his face. His arrogant grin had turn into a crooked and startled smirk.

“Why must agents always write in riddles? What does it mean?

\- The Martells will soon announce Myrcella and Trystane’s marriage,” she slowly said. “Have they already?

\- Not yet, but they are currently preparing the ravens.

\- What about the spear? The… Oh.” Jaime’s face fell, losing any trace of his forced casualness. He darted her a glance. “When you said “her”, you meant _her_?

\- I meant Daenerys Targaryen, yes.”

She had not uttered her name in months, perhaps _years._ It was almost taboo in the court. The only time her existence was truly acknowledged was when the Dance ended and when the court realized that there was one Targaryen left, with three dragons. Tywin had not yet returned, so she used Margaery and her influence to stifle the rumours and the concerns. The war against the dead was won not long after that and concern was replaced by victory and happiness. _But the Tyrells never forgot,_ she thought, _that another queen lived in the East._ Not more than she did.

“But she is still at war with the Free Cities,” Jaime retorted. “Still fighting to regain control over the Slaver’s Bay. Why would Doran take the risk of declaring his allegiance now?

\- None of that matters.” She shook her head and took the message to read it again. “She no longer cares about the East. They betrayed her, all of them, when they rose in favour of her nephew.

\- They would not use a wedding as a decoy for an invasion, would they?

\- Her advisors are smarter than that. _Prince Doran_ is smarter than that.

She closed her eyes again. _Weddings in all colours._ Everyone remembered the Red and Purple weddings; everyone remembered when House Stark was destroyed, and everyone remembered the sight of the late king Joffrey suffocating to death. There had not been a green, a gold or a crimson wedding yet. _Green, gold and crimson._ Tyrells, Lannisters and Targaryen, or perhaps Martells, all in the same castle for the same wedding. _A quiet fire burns just as hard._ There was no invasion involved her, no violence. _This is not a decoy,_ she thought. _This is the plan._

“She is not going to invade at all,” she eventually said. “Not yet, anyway.

\- Then why mentioning the wedding and the Targaryen girl in the same message?

\- Because we have all understood the cost of war. This is not Doran opening Westeros’ gates to her armies.

\- Enough with the riddles, Shara!” Jaime jumped from his seat, now fully unnerved. “Speak clearly, if this message means that war is returning…

\- War has never ended.”

Tywin had spoken harshly, almost angrily. His tone surprised her, for a second, and it took a few seconds for his face to compose itself again. For a moment, his emerald eyes were burning like two cold pyres, with anger and frustration. She knew what he thought; that everything he had done, everything he had won, the realm he saved and the battles he led, none of that would matter when the Targaryen arrives on her dragon, raining fire and blood over the Seven Kingdoms. They both knew it would happen; they both hoped they would have more time.

It only lasted a second. His cold and stern demeanour returned immediately after she noticed the change. They exchanged a glance as Jaime paced the room back and forth. Asking a silent question, she waited for the answer. _Do I say it?_ He nodded, imperceptibly. _Say it._

“This is Doran’s attempt to avoid war,” she slowly said. “And her only warning. 

\- Either we take the chance Doran offers us to prevent a full-fledged war…

\- Or she will take what is hers, with fire and blood.”


	2. ... But it can always be undone

“That does not make any sense,” Jaime retorted, still pacing the room in front of the desk. “Neither of you make any sense. Why would she let him take the lead of her own invasion? She has waited years for this, why delay it now?

\- She has waged a war before, she knows the costs. As for Doran, he has spent his life maneuvering around war.” She glanced at him. “She probably was not that hard to convince.

\- Lest you forget, Doran is her family's oldest ally. With the end of the Dance, she is the last leaving Targaryen and there was never any proof of that silver-haired boy being prince Aegon... It is no surprise prince Doran negotiated this.

\- Yes, yes, you both see crystal clear through their subtle plans, congratulations. What is my part in all this? Why am I here?”

He faced Tywin again, ignoring her as she pushed her chair back to be able to look at him. He was fuming, strangely infuriated by the situation. _Not that surprising._ He had spent four years away from the Red Keep, only barely informed by her letters – if he even read them, and by whoever served as maester in Casterly Rock. He knew about the Targaryen, but probably elected to forget about it all. She was _her_ plan, _her_ war. Much like his memories of him she pushed away, he must have tried to forget everything that resembled _her_ too much.

Now that he had barely returned, barely faced the full extent of what it truly meant to be back – now he knew that his own daughter’s wedding would be used as the antechamber of another war. Jaime Lannister _was not_ upset without reason.

“The invitations will soon arrive. I will not attend,” Tywin declared, raising his hand before any of them could interrupt him. “The king will, as well as the queen.

\- You are allowing the Tyrells to get close to…

\- Either they do it today in broad daylight or they will tomorrow, cloaked in secrets and shielded from our eyes. I want you to represent House Lannister in my stead,” he continued, looking at them both in turn. He stopped on Shara. “You will be my eyes, ears and mouth. As you will be an easy prey, Jaime will keep his eyes open.

\- On them,” she hissed. “Or on me?”

He did not reply. _Of course he does not._ She would be everyone’s trump card – most of the guest would not know what to expect of Tywin Lannister’s wife. Very few of them knew her and only a handful ever exchanged words with her. The only things they knew were the nature of their marriage – forced, and the rumours about the War of the Five Kings and the dark events that ended it. The Red Wedding, the Fires of Duskendale and Baelish’s demise. An apparently shifting loyalty, ruthless decisions and a secretive personality – except for those who knew better, she could very well be a pawn in anyone’s hand. _He still does not fully trust me_ , she mused.

“They would have sent an invitation to Casterly Rock anyway, why having me come?

\- None of what we are discussing could have been discussed in Dorne. I need House Lannister to look united, strong and unwavering.

\- As if that could change anything to the fact that you are sending us to negotiate our surrender.”

Silence ensued. A heavy, loud, deafening silence that meant too much and not enough at once. No one said anything for a while. _Is that what this is about?_ Play hide and seek for a time, and, once the cards turned, surrender? _What else could we do?_ Tywin’s face remained unreadable the entire time and his eyes pierced through them. _He cannot have given up, not yet._ Not after everything they did, not after all it took. It was simply too early to give up on everything they built and managed to keep standing.

“We shall discuss that later,” he eventually worded, ice cold. “You surely need some rest after such a long journey.

\- I am sure you two will devise some clever plan I will have to dutifully follow. Is it not…

\- Your room should be ready. Downstairs.”

Jaime remained still, defiantly sustaining his father’s stare. All it took was a dozen of seconds before he gave in and looked away. He stiffly bended his neck and left the room without looking back. As the door closed behind him, silence resumed. She watched Tywin retrieving the parchments she had hidden and placing them back on the desk. After all these years she knew that he was not going to speak – the only reason why he had not already dismissed her was his sharp awareness that she was _not_ going to leave anyway. He would not make the conversation any easier for her, though. He would work, or pretend to, until she either became interesting or annoying enough to distract him. It was always like this when he knew she was about to confront him.

“You know what I am about to say.

\- And still I have not the slightest idea of what is on your mind.

\- Fine,” she retorted. “Have it your way. Why did you not tell me?

\- I was not certain he would really come. Given your history…

\- Do you not owe me an answer, after everything I did? Is it really all it is worth to you? _Weak japery_?”

His quill froze before it touched the ink pot. He kept his eyes on the parchment she was staring at for a moment, before he put the quill down and looked up at her. He did not sigh, he did not frown, he just looked at her. There was not discernable emotion on his face, in his eyes. Given the turn of both the conversation and the events, though, she imagined only too well how he felt. She felt the same; weary, frustrated, _angry_. And resigned, in a dreadful way. This was bound to happen, after all.

“It took some times before I could be certain this was truthful,” he eventually said, gesturing the letter he has shown them. “When it was done, I summoned Jaime. I was starting to think he might not come. I was about to tell you.

\- Why did you not tell me when you received it? I have informants too. I could have…

\- What your informants ignore, you cannot know better.” His voice was cutting, more than necessary. His fingers on the desk started drumming. _This is new._ “I hardly saw the point.

\- After all these years, you would think that we are past this,” she sighed, staring at him still. “But I suppose you can only take the doubter out of his doubts, not the doubts out of the doubter.”

The drumming stopped. It was one of the few things that had changed in his behaviour, when they were alone together. The little signs of reflection, questioning, annoyance or doubts. With Jaime he was unreadable – with her, there were these little quirks that spoke a lot louder than he did. She never mentioned them, for fear that he might just stop it entirely, but she gradually came to the conclusion that he had come to trust her, in some ways.

 _I suppose I was wrong._ That would not the first time she came to the wrong conclusion with him, but this one she was pretty sure of, until this conversation. She kept her eyes still and her posture straight, shielding herself from his keen eye. It hurt more than she would admit it, and she absolutely did not want him to get her to admit it at all.

She was taken aback when he scoffed mockingly. She was expecting many reactions – or lack thereof, but she was not expecting him to just _scoff_. She frowned and waited for him to explain his change of mood. He shook his head as he leaned against the back of his armchair.

“After all these years, I should be used to your tendency to make everything about you,” he slowly said, mockery in each of his words. “But I am still marveled by your ability to always find a way to make _even a war_ about you.

\- Evading questions is one of your many talents, you do not have to make a show of it.” She tried not to sound as annoyed as she felt. His smirk left her no hope of her strategy working. “Why else would you have kept this secret? Why else would you have called Jaime to keep an eye on me during the wedding?

\- Does it never occur to your brilliant mind that just because you are involved in a plan does not mean it revolves around you?

\- Answer my question, Tywin. Why have you chosen not to trust me?”

His smile died as they stared back at each other. His eyes were icy, and she imagined that hers were as well. Daenerys Targaryen and her foreseen coming was not a matter he liked to discuss, much like most men disliked the subject of their own death; it was one of the many reasons why he did not mingle in her plans. He was responsible for the deathly silence that surrounded her at court, not her.

 _And I refuse to believe he is asking me to let go._ Tywin Lannister would not surrender his power, his shadowed crown and everything he won to anyone, including a girl with three dragons coming from the East – he would not. If Jaime even believed for one second that he would do so, then maybe he did not know his father as well as he thought. No one in their right mind could truly believe that _Tywin Lannister_ would yield so easily after defeating four wannabe kings and _death itself._

“Answer that question for me, _Shara_. Why would I choose to distrust you? Why now?

\- Alright,” she hissed, standing up from her chair. “I will not stand for this.

\- You are not going anywhere.

\- Watch me.” She eyed him for a second. He had not made a single move. “I have better things to do than play riddle.

\- You are not going anywhere because you still have not understood anything.”

_You bet I do not understand anything_ , she thought angrily. She headed for the door, about to storm out of his apartments, but she had hardly reached the door when he grabbed her wrist and stopped her on her way. In her fury she had not heard him standing up and going after her. She tried to pull her arm away from his grip but he held on. As she struggled against his tight hold, she eventually looked up and sustained his stare again.

His humour had completely vanished, replaced by a cold, stony glare. It meant a lot of things, none of them particularly positive, but mostly it meant one thing: _you are not thinking straight, get over yourself._ She had seen this particular glare more than once, but not in a long time. Usually it was how he looked at Jaime’s letters, when they arrived. When Cersei last visited, she was given this glare every time she dared talk back to her father. How insulting it was to be glared at the same way as she had been.

“Very well,” she hissed, struggling still against his grip. “Entertain yourself, teach me all I refuse to understand.

\- Answer your own question.

\- Why would you choose to distrust me? Let me see.” She scoffed bitterly. “A traitress always remains a traitress. I could turn against you and join the winning side of the war, given that I already did it once. I could also play on both sides and make a decision at the very end – something I also did once. I suppose I could also play a very dangerous game and get the two sides to collide, destroy each other and step out of the melee to crown myself in the end. My fellow Valemen seemed to be quite fond of this tactic during the last war.

\- Very fine reasons indeed.

\- But all of this does not take into account the _war I waged for you_ and the amount of blood and destruction _I created for you_.

\- It does not.” His hold on her wrist lessened as his other hand tried to cup her face. When she shook it off, he seized her chin to keep her still. “But who knows about that?”

_You do,_ she almost retorted. She did not, because slowly she began to understand that that was not the point. _This was never the point._ Apart from Jaime, no one knew how involved she had been in the Dance of the Dragons. Some suspected that maybe the crown had interest in the eastern war, but no one dared assume that interests meant _direct action._ Even the Tyrells ignored the full extent of her part in the conflict.

 _That is the point._ Summoning back Jaime to King’s Landing in order to keep an eye on her during the wedding, her remaining blissfully ignorant of what was unfolding in Dorne – all of that served one purpose and one purpose only. _Fool everyone._ She was right when she guessed that she was bound to be everyone’s wild card during the marriage; she simply stopped too early in the reasoning. _Stupid woman,_ she admonished herself. _All it takes is a little cut on your pride and Jaime back and your oh-so great mind is as good as gone._

“This will not fool them all,” she slowly said, struggling no more. “They will see through the ploy.

\- Will they? I remember a woman saying that smartness is the most dangerous weapon against smartness. That smartness blunts itself when confronted with its equal.” He smirked. “The wedding will host some of the brightest minds of the realm, but all of them will strive for the exact same thing. None of them will know for sure what you are striving for, but they will all know you can either bring them solace or destruction.

\- You are asking a lot from me.

\- I am not asking.”

_Demanding._ Ordering. She remained still for a moment, processing the full meaning of his plan. _Look like the innocent flower,_ she thought. _Be the serpent underneath._ Flowers and serpents would be the greatest threats, once in Dorne, and this plan would be her only hope of survival – both figuratively and literally. The Dornish might be easy to convince, only Doran had met her and it was years ago, despite his insistent invitations. _The Tyrells…_ The Tyrells were a whole other thing. They knew exactly just how far the Hand of the king could go and, although they could not know for sure that the Dance was her doing, they also knew how far she had gone during the war. Treachery was the least she could do.

After a while she slightly leaned unto Tywin’s touch and closed her eyes for a second. For as long as it lasted, none of them moved. Lost in her thoughts, she imagined he was also plunged in his own. Hers revolved around very dark places. _War, again. Except that this time, we will not win._ What would they do, when fire rains from the sky? Where would they go, when blood covers their walls? _Enough,_ she admonished herself. _One thing at a time._ First the wedding. Then… Then.

“You never even thought of negotiating, have you?” she asked, looking at him again. “It was just a way to keep Jaime in the dark, was it not?

\- Did you believe I had?

\- Not a second.

\- Obviously.” He smirked, a discreet shine in his eyes. “So long as Jaime acts as if you were a wild card, they will act accordingly.

\- Of course you remember that he left in the first place because we lied to him.

\- There will be nothing to leave if we do not do as we must,” he retorted, cold again. “You will decide as you think proper when you are there. For now, he must see you as a potential threat to the negotiations.”

She nodded silently. He released both her wrist and her face, but did not return to his desk just now. He lingered there, detailing her as if he had not seen her in a long time. Perhaps searching for something, but there was no telling whether he found it or not. He just took her hands and planted a chaste and formal kiss on her fingers. His eyes did not leave hers while doing so.

He turned away and headed back to his desk, his back turned on her. She did not leave yet, she watched him. He was sending her straight into the vipers’ nest, to battle with their fangs and their venom. Once there, there would be nothing he would be able to do for her; she would be alone against them. _Just as I was before,_ she thought. _Alone against him, and Cersei, and Stannis, and Baelish._ It was just her against the entire world, back then. Now it was House Lannister against the entire world and three dragons, but in the end it all came down to her.

A shiver ran down her spine as she slowly came to understand just how heavy a burden her had just placed on her shoulders. _House Lannister, House Arryn, an entire dynasty and the result of two wars,_ she had shouldered the survival of all these things during the Dance but she was never truly the one battling to preserve it all. This wedding changed everything.

“How long?” she asked after a while. He kept on piling his parchments as if he had not heard her. “How long did it take for you to accept to place everything into my hands?

\- Long enough.

\- There was no other way, was it?

\- None sustainable.

\- So this is how desperate we are.” She nodded to herself, silently. “Desperate to the point where I am the only sustainable way to keep us alive.”

He did not say anything this time. There was nothing to say. _Yes._ Somehow saying it was even worse than just _knowing_ that it was the only thing he could say. She remained standing for few more seconds and turned away to leave the apartments. She walked past Tywin’s guards, hers, and returned to her apartments. She did not even know where to begin – should she write to Nestor Royce? To tell him what? _Prepare yourself for war, again?_ Get ready to close the borders, and pray that Daenerys Targaryen forgets that borders never stopped dragons? _Pray that our demise will be swift and painless?_

She took a deep breath, urging herself to clear her mind. She could not allow herself _panic._ She could not afford _panic._ She needed a clear head, clear thoughts and a solid spine. _For what? This is already over._ No, it was not. It was not over so long as she kept breathing. She would _not_ let it be over. Best to jump from her window now if she refused to fight to the bitter end.

She took another deep breath. No letter. No proof, no evidence that she knew what was about to happen. Tywin kept her in the dark for as long as he could to ensure no one could possibly predict her reactions; she had to keep it that way. _Pretend I do not know anything._ Pretend _he_ did not tell her anything, _he_ kept her in the dark, _he_ endangered their children by doing so. If she kept to that plan, the only thing she would have to explain would be Tywin’s sudden change of behaviour regarding her. _Suspicions. The Old Lion is getting old, distrustful and never quite trusted me._ It sounded perfectly believable, to anyone including those who knew him.

Another deep breath. She had to play the perfect Hand’s wife, including for her closest entourage. She grabbed the thin cord that ringed a bell in Maester Rubben’s apartment and pulled it twice. He knocked at her door barely two minutes afterward and entered. After a quick bow, he cleared his throat and waited for her orders. She looked at him for a few seconds and smiled.

“Maester. Have you heard the news?

\- About Ser Jaime, my Lady?” She rose an eyebrow. He shrugged. “This kind of news travels fast through the Red Keep, especially as it caused quite a ruckus.

\- He can never do anything without causing a scene, I suppose,” she sighed. “Well, I did not call you to speak of rumours anyway. He seemed exhausted by his journey when I saw him. Is there anything you could do for him?

\- I have a few things that could help, yes.”

He frowned, ever so slightly. The years he spent with her in the Red Keep had not really turned him into a good schemer, or a good liar at least. His face was still an open book. He did not understand why she called _him_ , and not Pycelle. He was still in charge of the wellbeing of the entire court, with the exception of herself – Maester Rubben was _her_ maester, and her children’s too. He was not her husband’s, the king’s or the queen’s. Only hers.

Which made him the only man, apart from her Lord husband, allowed near her. _Which also made him one of the most distrusted man of the Red Keep._ The Tyrells were convinced he knew things no one knew; most of the court was absolutely certain she entrusted him with shadowed missions. Maester Rubben was just a maester, though; she did trust him, to some extent, but to heal her and keep her in good health. The only secrets he knew were those he guessed himself, and he was wise enough to keep his mouth shut about them. As far as she knew, he enjoyed the aura of mystery he carried with him. _It does help with the Ladies, I suppose._ As long as he remained quiet, he could very well bed whoever he wished.

“Would you be so kind as to take care of him as you take care of my children and I? He is family and I wish to treat him accordingly.

\- Grandmaester Pycelle will not appreciate that, my Lady.

\- It is a miracle Grandmaester Pycelle still stands,” she retorted with a fixed smile. “I do not fear his wrath.

\- You should enjoy the little time we have left with him. The next grandmaester may be less accommodating.

\- Oh, I assure you he will be.”

Maester Rubben did not conceal a smirk. She did not refrain from returning it. He eventually nodded and patiently waited for her to either send him away or ask something else. She simply looked at him for a while, searching for traces of the last years on his face. _Jaime lied,_ she thought. Time had spared no one, not him, not even her. He was still rather young for a maester, but his red hair was streaked with lighter strands, _grey_ strands. They were still discreet for now. When he realized she was not going to say anything before long, he cleared his throat and uncomfortably shifted his weight on his feet.

“Does my Lady need something else?

\- I do not. I was just… Reminiscing the last few years.” She forced another smile. “Forgive me, Maester. You may leave.

\- I imagine stumbling upon Ser Jaime must have been quite disturbing.

 _\- Disturbing_ ,” she repeated. She scoffed quietly. “Are you trying to imply something, Maester?

\- No, my Lady. Should I see to Ser Jaime’s needs immediately?

\- Do so, yes.”

He bowed and left the room, not without a last glance. She ignored it and pretended to read her correspondence – one she had already read. As soon as the door closed she let out a sigh and closed her eyes. _And now my work begins._ She corrected her hair, even though no one was looking. From now on and up until the end of this silent war, whatever its outcomes, everyone _was_ looking, and listening, and spying. She remained like that for a while, composing herself and steeling her mind, before she slowly rose from her chair and left her room. Her day had to go as it was supposed to; she was supposed to attend her sons’ lessons, today, and so she would. The Tyrells would come to her soon enough anyway.


	3. Fool's gold

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hi everyone! Thank you for all your comments and your interest! 
> 
> Some of you have asked interesting questions, so I figured I might answer it here so that everyone could see:
> 
> What are Shara's real intentions?  
> Well, I won't answer this one just yet, will I? ;)
> 
> Why is Dorne supporting Danny?  
> Dorne supports Aegon in the book!verse indeed (and so did they in that verse). Their allegiance changed for reasons that will be given in due time - bear with me on this one too.
> 
> Is it wrong that I still prefer Tywin/Shara?  
> Nooooooo, it's the reason why we're here every sunday, isn't it? ;)
> 
> Aaaaand I'll leave you to the next chapter!

“Lord Alec, will you please remain seated? Your Lady mother will arrive shortly, and she would surely not appreciate the sight of you jumping like a jester.

\- But I am _tired_ of the lessons! You promised today we would see the _knights_!

\- And you will, but not before we are done with your heraldry lesson.

\- But…

\- Well,” Shara said, finally entering the room she had remained at the entrance of. “Are you not interested in your own lands, son?”

The two young boys jumped, on their chair and then on their feet, and bowed in the dramatic way children usually bowed. She smiled and gestured them to sit again. On the table in front of them, Maester Rubben had unfolded a rather rough map of the Vale. She did not recognize it, and supposed it was his own. _I should give him access to more proper maps,_ she thought as she inspected the flags depicted on each castle.

Now that he knew she was watching, Alec accepted to sit properly next to his ever-obedient brother who was staring intently at the map in front of him. Jon probably already knew half of the heraldry of the Vale _and_ the Westerlands by now, and although it was an impressive feat by its own rights, he seemed willing to remember it _all_ before he turned five.

“Are you pestering your Maester, young man?

\- No, Mother,” Alec shamelessly declared. It only took a few seconds of staring before he looked away and pouted. “But it is _boring_!

\- Is it? These sigils and names are not just ink on old parchment, Alec.” She walked around the table to come between the twins. She showed them Wickenden, and the coat of arms of House Waxley. “This is not just six white candles with red flames within silver candle holders, on a grey field within a black border. This is where I first met Maester Rubben, when I reclaimed the Vale for our House. Lord Edmund Wickenden has always been a very loyal subject too. He is the one who sends you your beeswax candles for each of your name days.

\- You come from Wickenden, Maester?” Jon asked, his interest doubled with the sudden details. “From the Vale?

\- I am afraid I do not, my Lord. But I have had the pleasure to spend some times in your lands.”

He glanced at her. _Before I stole you from Lord Waxley,_ she silently finished. She did not conceal a small smile before looking at the map again. Heraldry lessons were definitely not the most interesting lessons for children, especially children as young as Alec and Jon – but time and experience had taught her that in the world they lived in, they might also be the most important. _In the world we live in now,_ she corrected. _Who is to tell how the next world is going to be?_ She kept on smiling, maintaining composure while showing Gulltown and starting to tell them about her journey there, four years ago. She tamed the story, of course; they did not need to know just how many threats she had uttered to make sure the former Lord of the city changed side.

She managed to seize Alec’s attention, and the two boys listened very carefully. They were starving for attention, from both of their parents – but from her especially. She had not always been present enough, and although the war had been a good enough reason, she knew what it felt like to yearn for as little as a smile or a gaze. Tywin had left long enough to find young boys where he had left toddlers and he was no warmer with him than he was with the rest of the world. She herself wished she could be warmer with them, but she had troubles figuring how. Instead, she tried to get involved as much as possible in their teaching and education. _Every two days, two hours._ The entire court knew that there was no point in trying to reach her during those two hours. _I suppose that too will soon change._

“What about the Eyrie, Mother?” Jon asked once she was done depicting Gulltown. “Maester Rubben said the towers touch the clouds!

\- It is the most stupidly beautiful place in the Seven Kingdoms,” she heard behind her back before she could say anything. She froze, still unused to the sound of this voice. “Especially during wintertime.

\- Ser Jaime.” She turned to look at him. He was no longer wearing his armour, and instead had put on a rather simple leather doublet. “How surprising to see you here.

\- The Hand of the king told me you were participating in your children’s lessons today. I figured I had to finally meet my brothers.”

They stared back at each other for a few seconds in complete silence. At her sides, Alec and Jon were looking up at her, and then at their _brother_ , and at her again. _Play your part._ She eventually smiled and looked down at the two boys to encourage them to go meet their _brother_. They made careful steps forward and, when they saw Jaime smiling too, they walked more eagerly. This smile was genuine, more than hers anyway. He knelt to be able to look at the both of them properly and she did not miss the quick glance he shot at her after inspecting them both. She did not react, but noted the very faint gleam in his eyes.

“Little ones,” she said, keeping her smile. “You remember Ser Jaime, do you?

\- Yes!” Alec enthusiastically said. “The best knight of the realm!

\- Come now, I can tell I have a much better knight in front of me. Who told you such foolishness?

\- Mother did!

\- Did she?” Jaime looked at her again, his smile turning into a mocking smirk. “What compelled you?

\- Truth, I suppose.”

She felt a pinch of cruel satisfaction when his smirk froze and tottered. He probably expected some witty answer, a clever evasion of his question – but brutal honesty served its purpose. None of the boys noticed the change in his expression, and instead drowned the new-comer in thousands of questions. She was about to ask them to calm down when Maester Rubben cleared his throat and called to order. They both looked at her with pleading eyes, _please let us stay with Jaime,_ but she gestured the table and the map.

Jon obediently returned to his chair while Alec sighed and moaned on his way. _This one is going to cause me trouble when he is grown,_ she mused when he eventually did sit on his chair and collapsed on the table. She glanced at Jaime who was no longer forcing a smile, now that the boys had their back turned on him, and just stared at them thoughtfully.

“Ser Jaime,” she asked after a while, loud enough for the boys to hear her. “Maester Rubben promised my sons that they would attend the daily training of the knights of our various guards. Would you, per chance, be willing to attend with them?

\- Gladly so, my Lady. I am sure Maester Rubben has many other things to do.” He looked at the man who bent the neck politely. “I can even take them myself. What do you say about that, young men?

\- Oh yes, _please Mother_!

\- I see no reason to oppose such enthusiasm.” She smiled when they both cheered. “ _After_ your lesson, of course. Study well, young ones.”

She exchanged a glance with Maester Rubben and gestured Jaime to follow her outside. She closed the door behind her once out and headed for his apartments, on the other side of the landing. The guards saluted her as they walked inside the antechamber and the maid curtsied deeply. She dismissed her and waited for her to be gone to sit on one of the armchair in front of the fireplace. The Tower of the Hand was relatively easy to keep warm, and she was never truly cold – even when water literally froze in cups, at winter’s worst. The Boltons had had furs and thick coats sent south for the royal family, both as payment and as reminder of the importance of the North. _As if we could not find furs ourselves,_ she thought while caressing the wolf pelt spread on her armchair.

She had not taken any of these coats or furs for herself. Some interpreted the gesture as sacrifice for the king and his queen, some as distrust for the new Warden of the North. The reason was more mundane; she had brought enough furs from the Eyrie to survive the entire Winter. She had Tywin take some of the Boltons’ pelts with him when he left for the Wall, though. No need to offend their only true ally in the North by refusing to use their gift.

“Your sons are fine young lads,” she heard behind her back. Jaime was filling cups with wine on the other side of the room. “They look very much like you.

\- Some days I find their resemblance to their father quite terrifying.” She accepted the cup he offered her and watched him sit on the other armchair. Silence lingered for a few seconds. “On other days, they look like you.

\- On their worst days, I assume?

\- Or their best. There is no in between, in this house of yours.”

She dipped her lips in the cup, hiding a smile. He did not, and scoffed while shrugging. Silence resumed and for a very long time, none of them said anything. And yet she had thousands to things to say; terrible things, good things, sad things, questions to ask, answers to give… She had forgotten just how conflicted her thoughts were when he was around. She wanted to slap him, embrace him, scream and whisper at the same time. _Four years,_ she thought, _and I cannot find anything to say that sums up everything._

And she was supposed to lie to him. That was the part she ought to play, just as he had his own. _The only difference is that he ignores what this part is._ She looked down at her cup and closed her eyes for a few seconds. She had never told Tywin what truly happened in the Vale, and in Saltpans before they departed to return to King’s Landing. For a while she thought he had guessed, and refused to address the matter. Lying to Jaime again and expecting different results than those that unfolded after Baelish’s death was probably the best proof she could be given that he had either not guessed anything, or guessed wrong.

 _I will not make the same mistake,_ she thought while looking at the fire next to them. _Not again._ They said that the definition of madness was doing the same thing over and over again, while expecting different results; she knew exactly what would happen if she kept Jaime in the dark for too long. He would inevitably trust her, or his father, or both of them, and he would inevitably get to realize that he had been manipulated all along. Nothing she could say would change anything to his reaction. _This time, though, he might very well turn his back on us as retaliation._ She would tell him Tywin’s plan. Not as long as they remained in the Red Keep.

“Why were you looking for me?

\- Not everything is always about you,” he scoffed, rolling his eyes. “Did I not tell you that I wanted to meet my brothers?

\- You surely wanted to.” She sipped her glass, still staring at the flames. “But you came at the very moment you knew I would be there too. If my sons were truly what interested you so much, you would have come an hour later, or earlier. So let me ask my question again, why were you looking for me?”

She looked at him again. He took a deep breath, emptied his cup and turned as well. He was smiling bitterly, like a man who knew that he had just been defeated – and expected to be. He admired his empty cup for a few second and put it on the nearest table before rising and pacing the room. She bit her lip and forced herself to remain composed. His presence made everything harder; from following the plan to keep her composure. _And keep myself from asking the one question that burns my tongue._

Truth be told, he did look like he struggled to remain calm as well. His fists clenched and unclenched, probably every time he realized he was clenching them in the first place; he seemed about to say something a few times, before reconsidering and remaining silent. He eventually stopped right in front of her, blocking her view on the fireplace. She raised her eyes and leaned unto the backrest. Her pride commanded her to smile, just as to make him believe she enjoyed his discomfort. _Not that it could fool him anyway._ The way he scoffed left little doubt about that.

“Your Lord husband informed me that the first invitations have arrived,” he finally worded. “He somehow managed to get a hold unto every each of them, but there is no telling when the Tyrells will get their hand on the news.

\- Assuming that they do not already know that the wedding will happen, but indeed.” A pause. “You do know, of course, that my _Lord husband_ would have informed me tonight.

\- You surely seem very sure of that, for someone who has been lied to for months.”

She kept her smile up. _You thick-minded imbecile,_ she thought to herself. Jaime Lannister had never been a good schemer, and he had partaken so very little in the last four years that the little talent he had in court-talking had completely vanished. He was trying to get her to talk about Tywin’s plan – of course. He was a lot more insightful than his father believed him to be as well, so it was hardly surprising that he suspected a hidden sense to his presence in the Red Keep. _The Gods know just how right he is._

It was just like him to make things unnecessarily more complicated. Playing stupid would not work with him, and laying all the cards on the table was not conceivable. _Why does it even bother me?_ It was not as if she had anything left to lose anyway; everything they used to have and used to be, she had lost four years ago in Saltpans. He did not return for her. He was not there to start things over and pretend nothing happened. _And even so, it should not interfere._ He would know, but not yet. _And the only reason why he will know is because he has only too many options to destroy us if anger turns him._ Or so she preferred to think, anyway.

“So you do believe the stories they tell,” she slowly said. “Of how eerily powerful he made me. I thought you knew your own father better than that.

\- I know just how much power he willingly abandoned you, Shara. I witnessed it.

\- You did, yes. A long time ago.” She put her cup on the same table and took a deep breath. “But your father never _abandoned_ anything to anyone, he allowed me to play a part. Now that my part is done, so is the _power_ you speak of. As for your arrival, there was never any kind of trust involved in this agreement of ours. Why would he have trusted me with this amount of secrets, so long as he ignored which part I would play in them?”

She rose from her seat as well, correcting a strand of hair that had escaped her intricate braids. The terrible thing in her answer was that it was entirely true. _Well, mostly true anyway._ She not longer wielded the kind of power she had wielded during the war and they never said they would ever trust each other. He probably kept the Dornish problem secret because he had not yet decided what he wanted her to do about it. _And he did lie for months about Jaime._ All of that were bare facts.

He knew that too, given how disappointed _and_ unsettled he looked. She did not look at him for a while, until she had reached the nearest window. The view was unremarkable, from this part of the tower. It was too low, and too close to the rest of the Red Keep. She would not have chosen this room for Jaime, if she had been told that he would come. The room closest to Alec and Jon’s, although not as nicely placed as hers and theirs, overlooked the harbour as well. From the window, one could see the dockworkers unloading and loading ships sailing from and to everywhere in the realm. _He would have liked it there,_ she thought. _More so than this excuse of a view._ Tywin never had a sense of hospitality.

“Were you hoping I would fall into your arms and promise you my help against his plan?” she finally asked. “Or maybe you thought I would reveal some secret plan to you?

\- It used not to be a ridiculous thing to hope for.

\- Once.” She smirked to herself and looked at him. “You seem to forget very often that four years is a long time.

\- I am sure he has been the best of husband and the best of father during those last four years,” he sneered. “It shows, in the way he is sending you and your children alone to negotiate his own survival.”

_You speak of these negotiations as if they made any sense._ For a few seconds, she remained unshaken. _And now, my entrance._ She slowly smirked and shook her head, clearly mocking him. _As long as he thinks I am a wild card, the rest of the world will act accordingly._ She had to look and act like a threat to the negotiations, did she not? Jaime’s assurance wavered when he heard her low chuckle. In his eyes she saw questions he would not ask. She offered no answers; she just headed to the door, to leave him with his doubts. It would fester in his mind, quick as he was to jump on the worst conclusion. He would probably try to warn Tywin. By then, however, the Tyrells would have noticed his distress and his distrust in her.

She had to talk to the little queen, now. It had been too long since the last time they had a luncheon together and the court was already starting to talk. It was common knowledge that the former best of friends were no longer so, but if she could get Margaery to doubt her certainties about her… Perhaps there was hope for the plan to come to fruition once in Dorne. _Chaos,_ she thought. _And division._ If she survived this, she would have to change her House’s words. _The rhapsodist will do it for me anyway._

“You cannot be seriously thinking you can double cross him on your own,” he said before she could leave. “The entire realm…

\- Knows exactly nothing of my part in the war. How comfortable indeed, to remain in the shadows. I am sure I can broker myself some allies.

\- Shadows can be dispersed. Do not…

\- Is that a threat?” she turned one last time to stare back at him. “Do you think it wise to threaten the Lord Hand's wife in her own abode?”

Silence returned, stunned. She had put more anger, more frustration and more _rage_ in those words than she should have, but this conversation was getting too long and it reminded her of a past she had hoped to have set aside. _Foolish woman, with foolish hopes._ Jaime was staring at her, and all traces of his assurance had washed of. He was desperately searching for something in her, a sign of something to tell him that this was just a show. _A sign of the past._

But he found none, because she did not let him. It was another kind of wound she inflicted to herself, to witness his change of demeanour as he slowly came to understand that he would never find anything left of what happened four years ago in the woman who stood before him. His eyes solidified into two blocks of ice and he clenched his jaw. Another kind of pain she thought she had forgotten. She shouldered that pain and slowly felt it turning into frustration. Anger. _Not again. I will not allow it._

“You are right,” he slowly worded. “Once again, I was a fool for hoping for more than you could ever give.

\- Glad you finally came to that highly subtle realization, Jaime. It took you some times.

\- What about your sons? Do they mean anything to you, or are you just going to use them to swindle yourself some safe conduct to escape before the world you have created falls apart?

\- You lost the right to emit any judgment on my choices,” Shara hissed, her voice rawer than it should have been, unsure whether it was her sons’ mention or the memory of their last confrontation that brought the coppery taste of blood to her mouth. “The day you stole them from me.

\- Four years, and this is still the only way you can sleep at night? Think that _I_ stole a choice from you, that could have made everything different?” He shook his head, his face distorted by disgust. The pain she felt at this sight was the exact same as she had felt the first time – a stab, right in the guts. _In the heart._ “Open your eyes, Shara. I could not steal a choice you could not even see yourself.”

She gritted her teeth, managing to keep her cruel grin up despite the fire burning in her mind. Nothing he could say could be worse than what she told herself countless times already. Nothing he could say could change anything to the fact that however terrible these things were, they never changed the ultimate conclusion that she would have made the same choices, over and over again, if given the chance to change it all. She had come to accept the conclusion. _He has not._

She had felt sorry for weeks, she had grieved him for months. It had taken her years to face what she had done and it haunted some of her nights still – the useless letters she had sent him those last four years served that purpose, of grieving something she would never have. But by doing so she, too, had forgotten that four years were a long time, long enough to change a man into a magnified myth. Just as she could not regret climbing down the Tower of the Maiden and stepping into the shadows, he would never forgive her for not staying there.

Jaime Lannister was just a man; a slighted, wronged man who refused to consider the reasons behind her choices when she tried to explain. _I wish you had never returned._ The magnified myth did not hurt that much; the myth never spoke back when she apologized. It never refused to hear her explanations. It never looked this disgusted, this angry. _I wish you had died in the siege of Riverrun._ She tilted her head, struggling not to go for his throat. _I wish I could have your head right now._

“Are you done?” she asked, her voice now even and cold. “Or do you need to express any further your frustration that, in the end, you suffered the most of your own choices?

\- You do not fool me. I know exactly who you are, _Shara Arryn_ , and this is a sham you are playing to convince yourself that you still hold control...

\- You should get yourself ready. My sons will soon ask for their tour of the training fields.” She turned away and opened the door. Her hand was slightly trembling when she turned the knob. “Good day, Jaime.”

She did not hear what he said; she closed the door behind her when she returned to the corridor. She should have returned to her sons’ study, to attend to their lesson; instead, she climbed the stairs that led to her apartments and locked herself in her chambers. Only when she was certain she would not be heard did she let out a groan of anger, frustration and helplessness. _I have held the fate of two empires in my own hands,_ she thought as she slammed the same hands on her desk, staring down at the wooden table. _Dragons killed each other because I made them._

In the last four years she had felt fear, raw and pure; anger too, against the Gods that were wicked indeed. She had felt more helpless than ever before, and restless too. When Tywin was away, she had wallowed in a cold and unforgiving kind of loneliness she had never truly stepped out of. But this kind of _rage,_ of _fury_ , she had not felt in just as many years. _I brought down two kings._ Last time she had tasted this much blood, there was a storm outside to match her rage. When she looked through the bay window, the only thing she saw was the sad, grey sky that had filled her horizon for years already. The storm had soothed her; this sight infuriated her.

In another snarl of rage, she threw away the pile of parchment placed near her hands. The letters and reports banged against the opposite wall and flew down, lazily. With another sway of hand, she threw the rest of parchments away as well; she was about to grab the candleholder to destroy it as well, but a sharp pain on her right hand stopped her.

She was bleeding. The cup of tea she had forgotten on a corner of her desk had fallen on its side when she had banged her hands on the table, and the fragile porcelain had cracked. She had run her hand on chips while throwing the parchments off the table. Drops of blood were now dotting the fur rims of her dress.

She slowly sat on the nearby chair, looking at the redness sipping through her cuts. It was painful and it would probably hurt for a long time, but the irradiating pain slowly brought peace to her mind. As she focused on the very real aching, her blind rage subsided through waves. _Just h_ _ow ridiculous can you be, Shara?_ She was a grown woman now, a mother of two who had remained still during a double war, and she could not even bear to have a conversation with a man she had not seen in four years? _The only thing you will achieve is your own bitter failure._

She let out a long sigh and buried her head in her unwounded hand, keeping the still bleeding one on the desk not to spill blood everywhere. _If the Tyrells could see you now, they would already blow the trumpets of your demise._ She gritted her teeth at the thought. _Tywin would have my head for that kind of ludicrous display._

“My Lady?” she heard through the door leading to the antechamber. “Is everything alright?

\- Yes.” She looked at the still closed door. “Please, have Maester Rubben called.”

The guard did not say anything, he just stormed out to bring back the Maester. _This cannot happen again. Ever._ Even if it meant avoiding Jaime until they departed for Dorne, she could not let the past haunt her now. It was a matter of survival; if she could not get rid of the past, none of them would have any future. _Can we even hope to have one?_

She violently shrugged off that thought when the door opened. _This is my duty. My only duty._ And possibly her last duty.


	4. So you want to start a war

Surely enough, the invitations were distributed the following morning. Although she was not surprised that he did not try to keep it secret much longer, Tywin did not directly tell her what his intentions were. When she asked his squire about him, after dinner and long after nightfall, he simply told her he had summoned an unplanned small Council to deal with _pressing issues._ She had to bit her lips not to sneer mockingly; the boy had no idea what he was talking about, but Tywin himself could hardly make the information clearer.

Her own invitation arrived with her morning correspondence, brought by a young girl she had already seen in the little queen’s entourage. She could not be older than ten-and-five and she seemed especially flustered to be here. She was holding her correspondence basket, filled to the brim as it usually was, and was standing still in her doorway, waiting to be allowed to enter the chamber proper. Shara finished her cup of tea before gesturing her to enter with a smile.

“Are you not sweet to bring this all to me,” she cooed, showing her her breakfast trail. “Would you care for a cup of tea, sweet thing?

\- I thank you very much for your offer, my Lady, but I would not…

\- You climbed your way to my room, you must be parched.” She filled one and handed it to her. “Here. Put the basket on my desk and have a seat.”

The girl smiled even wider, put the basket down and slightly pulled the chair away from the desk to sit with her cup. She sipped it and kept her eyes down, trying her best not to look too curious. _That is a bit late for that, girl._ She was a red apple Fossoway, one of the daughters of the two brothers of Ser Tanton who had died during the Battle of the Blackwater – Margaery had taken them in, exactly two years after the official end of the War of the Five Kings. _To show that the mistakes of the fathers will not weight on their daughters,_ she had said.

Everyone had applauded the initiative, of course, especially her entourage and her father. The Reach still had troubles facing just how divided it had been during the War, and now that the Tyrells had ascended to the throne it was a matter of survival for the former traitor houses to regain their liege’s trust.

And so the Tyrells had no closest allies than their former foes, those they had mercifully pardoned and given gifts and advantages. Aware that they owed their restored place solely to them, the formers allies of the late and infamous Stannis Baratheon were loyal to the death to their liege. Whether that strategy was one of Margaery’s or one of her now deceased grandmother was a question Shara had no answer to; in any case, it did not change its realization. The queen had made it her sacred duty _to bring the realm back together_ , while the Hand of the King fought a war against the dead and his wife ensured that one of the two Dragons in the East died before they could reach their coast. Under the guise of strengthening the crown, House Tyrell had made itself the most powerful house, military speaking. _Well played, I have to admit._

“Remind me of your name, sweetling.

\- Florence, my Lady.

\- Ha, yes,” Shara smiled again. “Well, Lady Florence, to what do I owe the pleasure of your visit? Or to whom, perhaps?

\- Her majesty wishes to invite you for an afternoon collation, and asked me to bring you that invitation myself.

\- Her majesty is too kind.”

_Her majesty is terribly predictable._ It was all exquisitely planned, indicating that she was right indeed when she told Jaime that the Tyrells might have known about the wedding before the invitations even arrived. The girl obviously knew nothing about that, she was just smiling from ear to ear because she had _finally_ been able to step into the infamous Tower of the Hand. _The Gods know what exactly the Tyrell suite says about us._ She had an idea, of course; she knew that Margaery was cautious enough not to say anything insulting or threatening about her. It was a balance of terror of a sort between the two women. The rest of her family, however…

“Well, Lady Florence, do tell Her majesty that I would be only too happy to join her.

\- The queen will be most happy to hear that, I am sure!” She rose from her seat and finished her tea. She curtsied and stepped back to the door. “Is there anything I could do for you, my Lady, before I return to Her grace?

\- No, sweetling. You may go.”

She nodded and turned to the door. _Or maybe…_ Margaery would not be easy to convince that the Hand of the king had suddenly decided to stop trusting his wife and instead threw her into the serpents’ nest with her two infant sons – she would rather believe it to be a very dangerous and subtle ploy to manipulate the main actors of the wedding. _This woman knows me too well,_ she thought as she rose from her seat, catching the girl’s attention. She stopped and turned again to look at her. _A good thing that I know her very well too._

Shara Lannister was not a good actress. A good liar, yes – but not a good actor. The queen had told her numerous times that she was too distant, too cold to be a really good courtier; her scorn, her intelligence or her lack of patience for stupidity showed too much when she tried to conceal it. Anyone smarter than a brick could tell she was pretending to be sweet, or sad, or enthusiast. After all, her ascension did not happen because she _pretended_ to be someone else. If anything, she was always forthright about her claims, demands and loyalty, to anyone willing to listen. _But no one knows how to listen._

That Fossoway girl knew none of that, and she was not a good listener. She only saw a very warm woman who had just offered her tea, and she now saw that same woman losing her smile and looking away, visibly disturbed and hesitating. And her first reflex, sweet as she was, was to make one step forward to offer her help, to lend an ear, _anything_.

“My Lady?

\- Well…” Shara took a deep breath and smiled again, sadder and seemingly more genuine. “If you crossed path with the Lord Hand, could you please not mention Her majesty’s invitation? I would not want to have to justify it tonight. These days…

\- Of course, my Lady. I shall only tell him I brought your correspondence.

\- Thank you, sweetling.”

Her smile turned brighter, relieved. The girl curtsied one last time and left the room. Shara’s smile vanished like melted ice and she returned to her dressing table. Her reflection in the mirror was a lot more genuine than whatever warmness or smiles she had offered the girl as she rolled her eyes and sighed. _Now, let the court magic happen._ Margaery would interrogate the girl about her reaction, and she would obviously mention her hesitation and her strange demand. She would not believe any of it, of course, and dismiss it as a weak attempt to indirectly manipulate her.

 _But the idea will be planted in his mind, like a seed awaiting a single drop of water to grow._ And fester. For all her brightness, the queen was a young woman still, and a very sheltered one at that. She certainly thought she could be ruthless and unforgiving, but as of now she had no idea what those two words meant. If Jaime acted as he was supposed to, and revealed either voluntarily or simply by being a poor liar that she was hoping to play against her husband and his house to save her life, her house and her sons, then maybe there was some hope left that they could be fooled. _Although the question remains; what for?_

She refused to consider either the question or the inescapable answer, and called her maid to help her get dressed. She had a few things to do before joining _Her majesty_ for her afternoon collation, one of them being the writing of a letter to Lord Nestor Royce to somehow get him to decide to review the troops on his own volition. _No trace,_ she told herself as she wrote the first words on her parchment. _No sign._ Just her, and her knowledge on how the man worked. _Even he cannot realize I was the one who suggested that idea._ She mentioned _Ser Jaime’s return_ , and reminisced _with a surprising melancholy_ the weeks they spent in the Vale, although _of course it was not weeks of leisure but of battle._ She wrote a few words about her _guards_ in the Red Keep, and how they equaled their _Tyrells, Lannister and white-cloaked counterparts._ She thanked him for his report on the reserves, and asked him about his wife’s health since his last missive.

She barely ate at lunch, and had the letter sent as soon as it was dry. She could only hope this would be both enough and not enough, now. She reviewed a few more reports on the state of secondary reserves, especially Dragonstone’s – now that it was under Ser Kevan’s supervision, the city-island seemed to enjoy a newfound prosperity. _Sort of, anyway._ It was still a desolate rock in the middle of the Blackwater Bay, but with Shara’s help he had managed to populate it with refugees from the northern territories. They had helped with the dragonglass extraction and they had slowly settled on their new island. Kevan himself was always between King’s Landing and his new castle, although his ward, Lord Robin Arryn, remained with his family when he traveled to the capital. He was to arrive in a few days, to attend the festivities before most of the court left for Dorne – and probably to receive orders from his brother.

Shara only left her room once done with each of these letters, covered herself with furs and climbed down the Tower of the Hand to head to the Maidenvault where the queen and her entourage spent most of their time. Although the queen shared apartments with the kings in Maegor’s Holdfast, she had kept her formers quarters as a boudoir and had a marvelous garden between the royal sept and the entrance to the Maidenvault. For a time, it had been practically impossible to reach the sept without losing oneself in roses, hedges and flowery scent.

Of course, when winter had truly arrived, the garden had lost most of its glory. Somehow, though, now that sun managed to shine at least a few hours every other day, some flowers had started to grow back – especially winter roses, sent by Lady Bolton to her _good friend_. It was too cold today to spend time between the hedges, so Shara entered the keep and followed the Tyrell guards who asked her to.

Margaery was alone in the second of her boudoir’s succession of rooms, her back turned at the door when she entered. She was looking through one of her many windows, probably at the serpentine steps that led to the inferior courtyard. She turned when the guards closed the door behind her guests and did not give her enough time to curtsy as low as she should have. She grabbed Shara’s hand and took her to the armchairs near the window she had just left, separated by a low table covered with sweets and cakes.

“Please, Shara, sit,” she told her as she sat as well, beaming as she usually did when she received guests. “How was your day? Lady Florence told me how sweet you have been to her when she came this morning. The girl was so red in the face that I feared she might collapse!

\- It was certainly not my objective. She is such a sweetheart.” She did not force a smile even half as bright as Margaery’s. It was both a waste of energy and counterproductive, considering her plan. “I have to admit that your invitation made my day a lot more exciting.

\- Ha, our old routine is oftentimes quite boring. I figured it had been long since the last time we got to talk.”

_A long time indeed._ Tywin had returned from the Wall less than a year ago, and they had not found themselves alone in the same room ever since. For the first few weeks, the exhilaration of victory had caught the entire court and everyone drowned in celebrations, festivities and outright jubilation. As the weeks turned to months, it became clear that with Tywin Lannister’s return the old power had returned as well, reducing as much the Tyrells’ power. When he started to rely more heavily on his wife for daily affairs, Her majesty her former _good friend_ turned her frustration toward her as well – behind smiles and dances, of course. It was only fair, after all. Their _friendship_ was built upon a two-sided beneficial agreement, and as Shara Lannister no longer needed her to keep the court together, Margaery Baratheon now knew as much as her _friend_ was willing to teach her. The queen was now an expert in all court-things and the Hand’s wife, although not loved, was respected.

 _The Queen of Thorns had warned her,_ she remembered, _and told her not to trust me._ She probably reminded her of her original treachery when it became obvious that the Hand would not release his grip on the little king, and his wife with him.

“Time has passed surprisingly fast since the end of the war,” Shara simply nodded. “It seems to me that it was only yesterday that we saw our armies return from the Wall.

\- And yet life returned to normal after this monstrosity of a war.” The queen looked outside her window again, her eyes following a squire climbing the serpentine stairs. “It struck me, when I received the Dornish invitation, that this is the first grand wedding to happen since my own.

\- And grand it will be, if the Dornish are to be trusted. This is, after all, a princely wedding for both the bride and the groom.

\- Indeed,” she said, softly. Her eyes slowly turned to stare at her. “You do not seem surprised, my Lady. Were you expecting this invitation?”

She refrained from smirking. _So much for talking._ At least Margaery had learned to go straight to her point. She, on the other hand, was not in such a haste. She rose an eyebrow, feigning not to understand why she suddenly spoke so harshly, and filled one of the cups on the plate with a light, almost pink wine. The queen was almost literally stomping her foot while she deliberately remained silent.

“Princess Myrcella has always been quite vocal on her adoration of her betrothed. I cannot say I am surprised to hear of their marriage at last.

\- Shara, I like to think we know each other well enough to spare ourselves this pap we serve to the court to evade their questions. Do not prove me wrong.

\- I was not serving you any _pap_.” She straightened her posture on her armchair, frowning. “Telling you that the news surprised me would have been one, but that does not seem to be the answer you were expecting. What was it, then?

\- Enough with your smart words. I am not blind, nor deaf, and although you may think so, I am not stupid.”

The queen rose from her seat, both angered and upset, and walked to the centre of the room. Shara watched her doing so, sipping her wine and remaining as composed as Margaery lost her own composure. _Is she really part of Doran’s plan?_ She seemed a little too disturbed with the thought of that wedding for someone who should have been the centrepiece of the Dornish schemes. _Once again the little queen is part of someone else’s plan,_ she mused with a hint of cruel satisfaction, _and she had not even been told._

After a few instants of pacing up and down the gigantic carpet in the middle of her room, she eventually took a subtle but deep breath and turned to look at her again. She was smiling again, but it was fixed and her usually soft brown eyes were cold. The resemblance with her grandmother was more striking now than ever, the horrid wrinkles and oldness aside. Margaery Tyrell’s patience was running thin. Shara sighed and shook her head.

“Were you hoping I would reveal some grand plan I would have conceived for this wedding? Some grand scale scheme?

\- I have heard the rumours,” she retorted, ignoring her questions. “That it is all the Hand’s doing, Jaime Lannister’s return right before the official announcement, you going alone to the Water Gardens to be surrounded by almost declared foes and the invitation’s delay.

 _\- Almost_ ,” Shara scoffed. _So she does know some things about that wedding, then._ “How euphemistic of you. And what do you think of these rumours?

\- I do not believe in any part of them. Did you really think you could fool us so easily?”

She let nothing show. She watched Margaery as she let out a low chuckle. _The wild card,_ she reminisced, forcing herself not to react. What she could have expressed in disdain and mockery, she turned into her more usual coldness and distance. Focused on those three words, _the wild card,_ she patiently waited for the little queen to have regained her composure and realized that her theatrics had brought her no reaction whatsoever. Her dissatisfaction was obvious. Her space between her elegant brows creased and she bit her lower lip, before smiling again. Cruelly.

“Oh, and that show you threw with Lady Florence,” she giggled. “Ludicrous. You really did move her, you know? _She seemed so upset, I thought she might cry!_ The gods be merciful, the things you make my Ladies say.

\- I suppose you could describe it as _ludicrous_ , indeed. I would rather say that it served its purpose.

\- And what purpose was that? Getting the whole court to believe that none of what is about to happen is your doing? That you are a victim of it all?” She scoffed. “I wish you good luck, Shara, with that endeavour. The court may be filled with senseless sheep, but it is a bit late to pose yourself as a victim of your glorious husband.

\- When have I cared for the court? My purpose was far lesser than that.”

She slowly rose from her seat and joined Margaery Tyrell in the centre of the room. She was unnerved and wary, unsure what to expect of her. _The first step,_ Shara thought, _in the right direction._ She smiled, not really trying to appear either friendly or comforting. This was not a friendly talk; they were not discussing the next ball.

They were discussing the next war, and the little queen was not quite as sure as she pretended of what side she would find her _best of friend_ on. She was blindly playing her pieces and waiting for her to either show her own, or reveal herself by her side. Either way, old habits die hard and she had seen too much of her pieces before not to expect anything and everything at once.

“After one of your Ladies-in-waiting told you of my distress, probably in front of witnesses, you maintained your afternoon collation… And decided to meet me alone.” She smiled. “Surely that was not your initial intent, otherwise you would have sought me yourself.

\- You would have sought me yourself as well, if your purpose was simply to meet me alone.

\- Ha, but you did not give me enough time. I just turned the situation to my advantage.

\- Every of your word is a carefully crafted lie,” she hissed back. “I do not trust you.

\- And you would be foolish to. In the process of not trusting me, though, do not forget who the true enemy is.”

She saw Margaery’s assurance wavering as she tilted her head and kept on smiling. One step after another, planting the seeds of doubt in the little queen’s mind, Shara could not help nurture those in her own. _You play your part,_ she thought. _What for?_ Tywin relied on her, but he only did so for lack of other choice. Surely the possibility of her going too far and eventually turning against him to save herself had crossed his mind. _It probably haunts his mind as much as it haunts mine._ If she kept on walking that path, if she were as convincing as he wanted her to be, she would eventually be given the choice of keeping to his plan, and face the likely prospect of her own death…

Or turn, and possibly save her life as well as her children. _And my House, but not my legacy._ She closed her eyes for a mere second to chase away those thoughts. _For now, Margaery._ The thoughts were not going anywhere, of course; but that choice was not yet open. She had just set foot onto the path that led to it.

“My true enemy has been your greatest ally for the past four years,” she hissed. “You know what they say, do you not? My enemy’s ally…

\- What a grand ally he has been, indeed.” She shook her head and looked away from her for the first time. “After everything I have done for him, the lives I have taken and the blood I have spilt, my only reward is a journey in the serpents’ nest.” She paused, let silence linger for a few seconds, and looked at the queen again. “We know each other well enough, you said, to spare ourselves paps. So please, Margaery, tell me: do you think I would endanger my sons’ lives for the sake of a plan that is bound to fail?

\- I think anyone who knows you should always expect the worst from you. You are not above endangering your own blood for you cold calculations.

\- Of course I am not. I have done so already. But not for nothing.”

_I should run away,_ nagging voices whispered at her ear. _Take the first ship sailing north, and climb the Giant’s Lance._ She could still run away, defeat the expectations; renounce everything and watch Westeros burn from afar. Suddenly it was all she could think of, that it was all for nothing. There was no hope for anything. All this pretending, this scheme, it was just evasion of the terrible, terrible truth: this game was a losing one.

 _Heads, they win_. Even if she did manage to fool Margaery, her father, the entire Tyrell House, Dorne and whoever else they might have involved in their coup, even if she decided to remain on Tywin’s side and managed to cause enough distraction to disrupt the negotiation process without getting killed in the process, all the king’s horses and all the king’s men would not stop Daenerys Targaryen if she decided to invade. And she would die like the rest of the old world she would destroy, with Alec, and Jon, her House and House Lannister. Ashes, scattered by the wind.

 _Tails, I lose._ If she decided to go against Tywin's wishes, she could probably manage to save her head as well as Alec and Jon’s. With enough skills she would be able to keep the Vale and retreat there – she would be Shara Arryn again. _But everything I have done would be gone, blown by the wind of her dragons’ wings._ She would be the twice renegade, the betrayer of two kings. History would only remember that. _But we would live._ He would not. Her legacy would not either.

The excruciating pain this impossible choice brought her must have shown on her face, somehow, because Margaery’s eyes widened, ever-so-slightly, as if she had just realized what Shara accepted to face only now. _This is about survival._ Of herself, or of her legacy. The two could not survive together. She had crafted that fate four years ago, when she had decided to return to Tywin Lannister instead of running away with Jaime when he silently begged her to.

“I have fought for my legacy, for power and for vengeance,” she slowly uttered, syllable by syllable. “I have won a war for these very reasons. The choices I have made were wicked and cruel indeed, but they served a purpose. What the Hand of the king is asking me is to put myself and my own children on the line, to negotiate with someone who does not need our consent to destroy us, surrounded by people who want _his_ demise, in order to save _his_ life, _his_ position. Does this look like cold calculation to you?

\- How can he hope to compel you?

\- He has only too many ways to compel me.” Shara scoffed, bitterly. “Did you really think that the true nature of our marriage has vanished through the years? Do you think Jaime returned simply to attend his niece’s wedding? My sons are young. My lands are far. My soldiers are few. My power was always vested by his good will, and The Lion has grown old and fears his imminent demise.

\- I really cannot tell,” the little queen softly said, now very much lost. “Whether you are wicked beyond salvation, or scared and angry beyond reason.”

_More likely both._ She could not tell if this was her part she was playing, or her survival she was bartering for. _Again, more likely both._ The taste it brought to her mouth was just as terrible as her complete and utter helplessness; a taste of humiliation and debasement. She who had held the fate of Seven Kingdom in her bare hand could no longer control her own. This little girl, this _queen_ only by name, had more control over what was to happen than she had.

The only thing she had left, the only thing she could control was herself now. Now that she could only face the truth and the impossible choice the future would bring, her very last weapon, the one no one could steal from her, was herself. _Just as it was,_ she reminded. _Before it all began._ In her cell, and then out of her cell when she faced Tywin on her own.

She did not have to think of House Lannister; she did not have to think of House Arryn either. She did not have to think of any legacy or life other than hers. These were all encumbering things; unnecessary to think of, for the time being. Tywin’s scheme relied on what she did best: survive, and thrive in chaos. Whether she decided to go through with it or not, this was the only way to step out of the fray alive. _Just as it was before it all began._ Locked in the Red Keep, alone and surrounded by enemies.

So she smiled at Margaery Tyrell, plastering on her face an amount of assurance she could not afford. She was in control of all that mattered, after all. _Wicked beyond salvation, and angry beyond reason._ It was a good way to word it, after all.

“I could be any of these two,” she replied in the same soft tone. “Or both. Or none. Who knows?

\- You just admitted that this was not a war you could win. Are you planning to negotiate your own survival, instead of his?

\- Would you trust any answer to that question?” The queen smirked and nodded. _Of course not._ “Allow me to say this: if this is war indeed, then no holds barred.

\- I do not particularly wish to find you on the opposite side, and neither does my father. We may be willing to… Discuss.

\- We shall see what side we find ourselves on. I never negotiate the end of a war that has not yet begun.”

Margaery narrowed his eyes while Shara grabbed filled two cups of wine on the nearest counter. She kept one, handed the other to the little queen. The two women looked back at each other for a few seconds, until Shara clinked her cup with Margaery’s. _And thus began the war._


	5. Shot's fired

With the invitations to the wedding all released, most of the members of the capital-dwelling great houses who had remained in their seat converged to the Red Keep in matter of days for the nearest, and weeks for the furthest. The Tyrell suite, however, arrived surprisingly early for the hundreds of miles it had to cover. _Not surprising, I suppose._ The suite itself was not very numerous – the most important part of it was Ser Garlan, who would attend the wedding in lieu of his crippled brother. The excuse was perfect, but the true intent was clear to whoever had some little as a half-brain to think: Ser Garlan Tyrell was recently widowed, his wife having died in childbed a few months ago. If the Tyrells were to broker a strong allyship with the Dornish or the Targaryen’s entourage, a handsome, still young man was a very good way to strengthen the ties. _Especially as Ser Loras is still locked in marriage with the former queen dowager._

Festivities were in order, of course, although it was not entirely clear what queen Margaery wished to celebrate. _My dearest sister’s union,_ she usually replied when asked. _The return of joy to the kingdom,_ sometimes. For those who knew, though, what the wedding to come would be about, it was clear that it could be the very last opportunity to feast under the Baratheon banner. House Tyrell’s debauchery of expenditure left little doubt about that: if this were to be their fast celebration as royal house, it had to be remembered _and it would be._

Shara was neither blind nor deaf. She saw and she heard the talks behind elegantly gloved hands; the court was beginning to take side, because a persistent rumour was growing that something was going to happen in Dorne, and that it would pit houses against each other again. Those who refused to bet were still more numerous than those who picked a side; the latter, though, all chose House Tyrell.

 _This is the last night I can hope to sleep soundly,_ she thought as she wrapped herself in a nightgown. Her maid had warmed up her bed and prepared the sheets, she simply had to slip under the covers and enjoy these last hours of relative peace. _Or pretend I can, anyway,_ she thought mockingly. She pushed her hair behind her shoulder and grabbed a candle before she left her apartments.

The guards barely reacted when she walked past them, she simply heard a quick and sudden jingling when one of them was torn off his slumber by the sound of the door closing. She made no comment to climbed down the stairs to Alec and Jon’s room. The guard let her in without a word.

It had almost taken half an hour to get the boys to stop pestering their _half-brother_ and demanding to be taken to the fields of training. Mostly it was Alec demanding, and Jon following – as it always was, really. Though it did not seem to bother the victim of their requirements, Shara preferred to keep him at bay for as long as possible. The journey to the South would be demanding enough; she did not particularly wish to anticipate the experience. The last traces of Maester Rubben’s struggles to keep the lordlings in place were the amount of torn parchments on their work table her candle shed light on when she softly put it there. The tantrum, however, was long forgotten. The two boys were fully asleep now, warmed under their numerous blankets and furs.

She carefully sat nearby, staring at them both from afar. _To be young, and naïve, and innocent like that again,_ she thought longingly. For them, the announcement of the wedding, of the festivities and of the journey they would soon start were all parts of an adventure. What else could it be? They were about to visit one of the wildest parts of the realm, finally step out of the Red Keep for the very first time. Children could not fathom the depth of human viciousness and they could not possibly conceive that their mother was taking them from one death trap to the other.

 _We do not hurt little kids in Dorne,_ she remembered prince Doran saying during Joffrey’s wedding. It was a badge of pride, for him, to differentiate himself from the monstrosity committed against his own blood within these red walls. Would it remain a badge of pride, when she becomes one of the last walls to knock down to seize power? Or would they become tokens, to be bartered against a swift surrender? _They will be my own weapons,_ she remembered. _My shield, to hide behind._ Was there a more terrible thought than that?

For an instant she hated Tywin for what he was getting her to do. For an instant she swore to protect their lives at all cost, their precious and innocent lives, even if it meant betraying him, his house and hers as well, and throwing everything she had done and built to the flames. Better than throw this all to the flames than them. It seemed so clear, for an instant, that whatever the Tyrells, the Martells and the Targaryen girl would ask, she would give if it meant protecting them.

 _But if it were so clear, I would have already thrown myself at their feet._ Surely it would have been the surest way to ensure their protection. It would have been the unquestionable move of a terrified mother, desperate to protect her children even before the threat turned real. _But I did not._ The most honest part of herself knew, despite herself really, that she was not going to throw herself at their feet and beg for their lives. If she did, her sons would never have _a life_ to call their own; their lives would forever be forfeit, _conditional_. They would lost everything, because she had nothing to offer in exchange of their survival. She had not given birth and almost died in that process to only be able to keep her sons alive.

_Or maybe that is just what I keep telling myself to be able to sleep at night._

“My Lady?” a hushed voice whispered behind her. She almost had a start, and turned to face Maester Rubben. “Is everything…

\- Shhh.”

She gestured the boys, sleeping soundly as if nothing were happening in their room, and waited for the maester to step out of the room to do the same. She slowly closed the door behind her and found herself on the landing, facing her relatively uncomfortable maester.

“I thought I heard your sons’ door open,” he explained after a moment of heavy silence. “I know the guards are supposed to watch over them, but…

\- Do not feel compelled to justify your watchful care, Maester. I just felt the need to see my children, before it all began.

\- Before it all began, my Lady?

\- You do not need me to explain, do you?” She smirked and shrugged. “In any case, I apologize for the disturbance. You may return to your room.

\- Of course, my Lady,” he whispered, bowing. He turned away and headed for his room, just next-door to the boys’. He stopped once in front of the door, his hand frozen in mid-air above the knob and, after a while, looked at her again. “Unless you wished to, perhaps, share a late cup of tea? It is brewing as we speak.”

Surprised by his sudden boldness, she did not say, nor do, anything for a while. _A late cup of tea with a maester,_ she thought. _How uncalled for._ Uncalled for indeed, but that man was a lot smarter than he let on and he knew a lot more things than he said. Four years by her side were more than enough for such a smart man to know exactly how she felt at that very moment, and why she had come to see her children sleep when she had never done anything of the sort before. So, despite herself in some ways, she nodded and she followed him inside his apartments.

She had not seen these apartments ever since he had settled there. They had not been used for a very long time, because the room was not exactly the biggest or the most well-placed part of the Tower. When her father lived there, that floor was left entirely unused and the furniture inside the rooms simply gathered dust for years. No one could really tell her who had last dwelled here – Tywin himself did not answer her question when she asked him. She suspected that part of Lady Joanna’s retinue used to live on this floor, back when he was Hand of another king, himself of another dynasty as a whole. There were pieces left of their stay, old and faded dresses left in worm-eaten closets figuring either the Lannister sigil or one of her husband’s bannermen’s.

Once the floor wiped clean, she had had him settle here because it was right next to her sons’ apartments, which was right under her own. The rest of the Tower remained just as empty as it had been for years, but at least the two top floors were lively – the rest of the smaller rooms of that floor was occupied by nurses, who would soon leave now that the boys were grown.

Since that time, though, Maester Rubben had made that place his own. There were bookshelves on every wall except one – to accommodate for a small bed. The entire place was rather shambolic but it did draw a smile on her lips. It looked exactly the way she expected a maester’s room to look like, especially _this_ maester’s. He went straight for a teapot near the fireplace, opened it, smelled it and filled two cups to the brim. _Cups stolen from the kitchens, if I am not mistaken._

“Do you put honey in your tea, my Lady?

\- No, thank you.” He gave her the fuming cup and cursed himself under his breath as he cleared one chair of the tons of clothing piled up on its back. She stifled a chuckle. “It is quite alright, Maester, I can stand.

\- Please, have a seat, and forgive me for the… General appearance of my abode. I usually do not entertain a lot of visitors.”

She dutifully sat while he found another chair under another pile of clothing and sat as well. He drowned his own tea under a spoonful of honey as she looked around. There was an open book on the desk, as well as many parchments in diverse state of completion. What caught her attention, though, was the one very carefully aligned pile of parchment of a shelf above the desk. Every page seemed to be covered with writings and it was practically the only thing he seemed to keep clean and ordered. When he realized she was staring, he cleared his throat and shrugged.

“A personal project,” he simply said. “Nothing of importance.

\- It does seem important to you. Are you hiding something from me, Maester?

\- I would not dare.” _Of course you would._ He dipped his lips in his tea and looked at her again, instead of his shelf. “I apologize if I sound indiscreet, but why are you not sleeping, my Lady?

\- You are indiscreet, but I came knowing that you would be.” She sighed. “You must know, of course, that this is the last night we can call safe and warless. The queen’s festivities will begin tomorrow, and we are to leave for Dorne in a fortnight.

\- All the more reason to sleep, at first sight.”

She was expecting him to smirk or to chuckle, but he did not. He just drunk his tea in silence, looking at her from his side of the room. She looked at her own cup and remained silent for a while, knowing full well that he would wait for her to explain _why_ , at second sight, she had decided not to sleep. _Weirdly enough, sleeping will probably be the least dangerous thing I will do in the next few weeks, months and, the Gods be merciful, years._ If she were completely honest, she would have admitted that she was not too sure herself why she was not sleeping soundly, enjoying that last night of peace and safety.

 _I suppose that if I slept, that night would slip from my fingers too quickly._ Holding back unto time – something she had never quite done. She sipped her tea and shrugged, silently admitting that none of what she was she was doing made any rational sense. That lack of answer seemed to satisfy him, since he slowly nodded. And silence lasted, longer than it should haven, but not in an uncomfortable way. Maester Rubben could have become a friend, if such a thing existed in her world; instead, he had grown into one of the very few people who could claim to understand her. He never bragged, though, or took advantage of it, or even used that understanding. He just understood, and acted the right way, expecting no particular gratitude or praise. _A good man._ One of the few.

“Your position is a complex one indeed,” he voiced after a while. “Not that you are used to anything but, though.

\- You would know.” She faintly smiled. “This time is different.

\- How is it worse than you climbing the Giant’s Lance while being heavily pregnant with twins to claim a title stolen by the man who single-handedly organized the last war?

\- Do not ask a question lest you wish to hear the truthful answer, Maester.

\- The truthful answer is what I am seeking, my Lady. However hard to hear might it be.”

_Or hard to tell._ She put the cup down and headed for the small window that overlooked the Red Keep inner courtyard. Even the torches could not shed light on what was underneath the Tower of the Hand, it was a lot too dark outside. Lazy flakes of snow were falling, but these were probably the last of that winter. Summer, as it seemed, had already started in Dorne; or a very gentle kind of spring anyway.

 _How do you tell someone whose life depends on you that there is very little chance we step out of this fray alive?_ If she were selfless, she would send him away, back to Wickenden or to the Citadel for some false reason, to ensure that at least he would find shelter somewhere when the storm arrived. For the same reason she had not already thrown herself at the feet of those who would create that storm to save her own children, though, she was not going to send him away.

As she turned to look at him again, she realized that he might not accept to leave if she ordered him to. Stubborn as that man was, he would quicker head straight to Dorne to prepare her arrival, or to the Vale to prepare her runaway, than he would leave her service or make fake researches in the Citadel. _My godless maester,_ she thought, _as Tywin calls him._ He deserved better than what she would be able to give him from now on. The least he deserved now was the truth… Part of it, anyway.

“When Ser Jaime and I left the Bloody Gate for the Eyrie, I expected to find allies in every castle we would walk through,” she slowly said. “We did not, as you know. But I had that hope in mind, and even when it became clear that it was a foolish thing to hope for, I still could expect at least a few men to join me and help me through the waycastles. So yes, I was pregnant and I climbed the Giant’s Lance almost on my own, but I did because there was a possibility, however slight, that I could actually prevail. It was not a losing battle.

\- The entire realm disagrees, my Lady.

\- Only because they ignore the full truth.” She paused. “This, the wedding, the Targaryens… Winning a battle will make us lose the war. Losing the first battle will simply accelerate our end.

\- _Us._ ”

She froze, unsettled by the comment. She was not sure what he meant by it. _Is he blaming me for the risk we are facing?_ That did not sound like something Maester Rubben would do, not after offering some tea. He would have sooner come to her room to somehow get to that point than he would have waited for her to wander aimlessly in the corridors at night.

And he was smiling. _No,_ she corrected herself. _No, he is not smiling._ He was smirking, in a rather mocking way, like he had just understood something about her that even she did not know. He sipped his tea and shook his head, scoffing to himself.

“I had not noticed until just now,” he continued. “How much you speak of an _us_ , lately. I could not say when it started, though.

\- Usually, _us_ is used when speaking of more than just whoever is talking. It so happens, maester, that I have two children and…

\- So you really do not see? You say the difference between your coup in the Vale and this wedding is the chances of victory, or lack thereof. With all due respect, my Lady…” He took a deep breath and rested his back against the chair. “If you truly thought you had any chance of actually reaching the Eyrie alive _and_ oust Baelish, I must say you were quite alone in that sentiment. Your situation now is no more desperate than it was when you dyed your hair black and left for the Gates of the Moon.

\- How so? Daenerys Targaryen is about to invade these lands, either by force if we refuse to cooperate, or by…

\- You did it again. _We_. Who is _we_?”

She frowned even further and put the tea cup on the desk, about to rise and leave this senseless conversation. Who was we? How could he ask such a stupid question? He had been living with her for four years already, he knew exactly who she meant by _we_. Her house as a whole, at least those of her house who lived in King’s Landing and far from her lands, whether western or northern. Her children, and her people, and Tywin, and…

She stopped in her move as it slowly dawned that it was _him_ he was talking about, not the rest of what _we_ meant. But it did not make any sense: _he_ was already there, four years ago, as she travelled through the Vale and up to the Eyrie. _He_ was everywhere, in the letters he sent and those she received, in her lies to Jaime regarding her pregnancy, in the doubts of her bannermen and in the responses she gave them.

 _But I was not battling for him,_ she thought. She was not protecting him, she was not sent on the frontline for him; she was not constrained by limits he had put and she never thought of him when she acted in the Vale. When she dyed her hair, when she pretended to be mute, when she spoke to Yaris and then to Bryant in the mountains; when she put herself in front of the arrows and when she pushed Petyr Baelish through the Moon Door, she did not think of _him_ , and there was no _us._ Just her, doing what she had to do. _He_ was looming somewhere above her head but he did not act through her the way everyone thought. _How is it possible that I only see that now?_

“So you are suggesting,” she slowly said, looking at her maester right in the eyes. “That Lord Tywin is the reason why this situation is so desperate. Are you not?

\- I suggest that you consider your situation desperate because you added obstacles that you did not have four years ago.” He remained absolutely still, looking back at her as if this were just another chitchat they would have. “Four years ago, you would have removed these obstacles, not despairingly tried to maneuver around them. You would not be here if you had not.

\- Not only are you calling Tywin Lannister an _obstacle_ , but you are also effectively telling me to turn against the father of my children and the Hand of the present king. Have you lost your mind, maester?

\- You might not need to turn against anyone, my Lady, if you do not blind yourself to the many opportunities you have to turn a seemingly desperate situation in your favour. You have done so already, many times.” He paused and looked up at the shelf where the pile of parchments was. “I understand that with time, some kind of… Familiarity might tie your hands. But do not let familiarity get in the way of your survival.”

_Familiarity._ Is that what this was about? A very uncalled for sense of familiarity, blinding her and tying her hands when she should be freed of all constraints to protect herself? She remembered what she had decided, in Margaery’s boudoir – that it would be like it had been a long time ago, when it was just her facing Tywin Lannister and surviving at all cost. That she did not have to think about anyone’s house, not even hers and not his. _I was mistaken. It is him I need to free myself of._

She hated herself, suddenly, for not realizing that she was letting him hinder her with his own plan. At the same time, though, she also hated herself for thinking she could just shrug this all off, all these years, all the things she had done for him. _But this is exactly what they are expecting of you,_ a voice she had not heard in years whispered at her ear. _The reason why you have to pretend to be a wild card._ Somehow, along the lines, everyone expected her to stay loyal to _him_ because she had taken a side in a long-ended war. _And so does he._ But when had she ever given him any reason to doubt that very simple fact? The Lady Shara stood by the Lord Tywin. It was known.

The full truth of that very simple statement, however, was not known by all. She had made the choice to stay when the Targaryen threat became real. _I decided to risk everything,_ she remembered, _in order to get everything._ She did not make that choice, and took that chance, only for reasonable and rational reasons of course – but there was a measure of calculation. She had stayed to trigger a dance and see what could come out of it, effectively gambling with the realm’s fate and her own.

Now one dragon was dead, but this one could not have breathed fire anyway if it had come to that. Out of the four left alive, one pretended to wear a crown and the rest _did_ breath fire. _The other dance was a lot more efficient in reducing the number of fire-breathing dragon._ To think she called that a victory: the realm was about to be invaded one way or the other, and she had stayed for only four years of war and shadows.

 _Which is what you wanted._ No, she did not want more war and more shadows. She accepted the necessity of the two things, in order to secure what she really wanted. _Power. Influence._ And _he_ brought them to her, then ensured she would keep them, then allowed her to use them. Maester Rubben was right when he spoke of blindness: frantically trying to find a way to reconcile what could not be reconciled, she had blinded herself to a very simple fact. _I have chosen Tywin Lannister for a reason and I have gambled because I thought possible to maintain that reason._ And even if that was not true on its own, it was the only thing that mattered now that it was obvious that he was no longer capable of giving her what she wanted. It had to be.

_But it is not, is it? Otherwise it would not feel so wrong, and so right at the same time._

“How seditious of you,” she eventually voiced. “And how cynical.

\- As I said, my Lady…

\- How cynical that after forsaking so many oaths and vows and duties to both the Gods and the men, forsaking this one seems so unbearably unimaginable that I needed you to remind me of the true nature of the game I am playing.” She shook her head, smiling bitterly. “ _Familiarity_. That must be true, however ludicrous that sounds. How come my sworn king was easier to betray than a husband I did not choose?

\- You only ever turned against those who wronged you, my Lady. That must be why.

\- You know that is not true.” _Think of the Starks. Think of Duskendale._ “And even if that were true, how do you call sending a woman alone with her two children right into a death trap, figuring that _familiarity_ and an absurd sense of loyalty owed should tie her hands tightly enough for her not to see that the easiest way out is betrayal?”

_I call that wronging me._ She slowly shook her head and shrugged with a faint smile. How fascinating, really, how quickly she had forgotten that the game they played, the game _she_ played, was not only played in Essos, or in Dorne, or in this castle. It was also played between the two of them, as it had always been. With every piece of the game came opportunities, and with every opportunity came options. _And I have to weight them, all of them, my every option._ Those that involved only her, those that involved him as well… _And those that do not involve his victory in the end._

It stopped her, that thought, that terrible thought. Everyone was a pawn, in Tywin Lannister’s head; some were just a bit more valuable, or a bit more maneuverable than others. She had not waited for his influence to be cast on her to see how that chess play worked and to play herself – she had spent years escaping everyone else’s game to be able to play herself the way she wished. On occasions she had pushed Tywin’s game in directions that suited her, to align their pawns the way she wanted to.

But never before did it strike her that Tywin Lannister himself could be a pawn in someone else’s game, the way she had been for too long, and that that someone else could be her. _I could bargain with his life._ The way he had bargained with her for a long time, the way she had bargained with the Starks’ lives before the Red Wedding, or with Duskendale, or with Stannis. _That_ thought stopped her and it both sickened and intoxicated that part of her who had started to whisper again, just as it used to whisper in the Vale. In the Eyrie. _I have killed a king, annihilated an ancient house, destroyed an ancient city,_ it whispered. _What is one more name on that list?_

But it was not just another name on another list, was it? It was not any _him_ , or _he_. There was a reason why she had spoken of an _us_ and a _we_ for so long. _It does not have to mean anything. What good does it make you, to be loyal to a dead man?_ Ned Stark knew exactly the good it made. Her father knew as well.

“My Lady,” Maester Rubben spoke again, probably noticing her daze. “I would not ascribe such dark intents to your Lord husband.

\- You would not, of course. I would.” A pause. “I do. It is a shame you had to say such blatant truths for me to see the obvious.

\- I do not wish for any of this to happen and I did not intend to cast doubts on the Lord Hand’s trustworthiness.

 _\- Trust_ is not something we can afford these days. He knows that.”

Whether he elected to rely on the ill-placed certainty that she would not endanger him or simply made the same mistake as she could have done if not for Maester Rubben did not matter. _I trusted him when he promised he would not let any harm come upon me._ He fooled her once, shame on him; shame on her for almost letting him drag her in his descent. The same voice urged her to keep her two eyes wide open now, and suddenly that voice reminded her of a man she had not seen in four years. That memory brought a smirk to her lips as she slowly rose from her chair. Her maester did the same, his eyes filled with unasked questions and remorse. She chuckled sombrely.

“It is a bit late to regret your show of wits, maester.” She waved him off because he could say anything. “It would have occurred to me at some point. Flatter yourself with sparing me the possible ordeal of a late realization. Although I must say… It does remind me of something someone told me a long time ago. Care to hear what it was?

\- My Lady?

\- During a storm, a man told me to keep both of my eyes on the wheel, now that it had turned for me. It could turn again, he said. It so happens that that man now stands beside the dragon queen. I think he already knew that it would come to that kind of choice.

\- As I said, my Lady, you might not have to choose between your Lord husband and…” He quieted, unable to continue. “You might not have to betray him.

\- You and I know, maester, how it will end if I do consider my every option. There is not that many endings to that story, and even less where I can walk out of the fray mostly unharmed.”

A shadow passed over Maester Rubben’s eyes, probably the same that had passed over hers when that thought struck. _There is no world in which both Tywin Lannister and I can survive,_ she meant to say. Those words, though, never echoed; she did not manage to voice them. She just headed for the door, thanking her maester for his time, and she left his small apartments.

That realization, however terrible, meant something else than just the obvious and painful impossibility for her to keep on pretending there was a sense to her frenetic search for a compromise. _If there is no world in which we can both survive this,_ the same voice whispered again, _then there must be one where I can live._ And maybe thrive again, albeit in a different way.

As she climbed the stairs that led to her apartments and looked at Tywin Lannister’s door, one last thought crossed her mind and remained, looming like a dark cloud. It was more a question, though, than it was another realization. _Can I thrive without him?_


	6. Silence and loneliness

Queen Margaery truly had an unquestionable sense of _drama_ , that was something no one could deny. She had decided to shape the festivities as to build up the suspense _and_ the lavishness; the first few days were surprisingly intimate. Quiet dinners and an evening listening to songs with her entire family, _her oldest and best of friend_ included. Of these last four years spent together, the girl truly had remembered one of Shara’s lessons and she applied it every day. _Keep your foes close,_ she remembered telling her before the war against the dead began. _But do not listen to that senseless saying, your friends should remain closer._ Only someone with very few and very unharmful foes could truly pretend to keep them closer than their friends.

She attended those small reunions, noticing with each of them the slow growth. It was all the better for her anyway, since it gave her time to prepare every single details of their coming departure. It was only a week away now, and although most of their chests were ready to be embarked on a ship, the most important aspects of that journey were nowhere near settled.

Tywin barely attended the celebrations, and he only chose those he could reasonably avoid - the dinners, for example. She did not really try to seek him, but even if she had, he sealed himself in his apartments most nights. _And most days._ It had happened before and considering his original plan, it made sense for him to spend as little time as possible with her.

But it infuriated her all the same, and it angered the whispering voice that was only too satisfied to point that _this_ was the proof she needed, if she even needed one, that he did not even _figure_ she could save herself and not him as well. _He does not even bother to make sure I behave,_ it whispered at night when she could not sleep, _in his mind it is just so obvious that I will._

But he was not that wrong, was he? It took a conversation with her maester to realize there were more possibilities than she thought, and since that conversation she could hardly sleep at all. Her mind was working, gearing, fuming as she tried to come up with an actual plan. She had already made some advances with the Tyrells, but any negotiation with Margaery would end up in her house’s favour – not in Shara’s, not in house Arryn’s and _decidedly not_ in house Lannister’s. She had no other tie to house Tyrell, given that her father barely acknowledged her presence and given the persistent resentment most of the family kept from her not helping the late Lady Olenna free their golden boy from his bounds to the queen dowager.

As for the rest of the fray, Prince Doran always seemed interested in gaining her attention – as testified by the invitations he sent her. He even tried to convince her to spend the war against the dead in Dorne with the rest of the court. She had refused on grounds of duties owed to the people of King’s Landing, but given that that wedding and the upcoming negotiations were his doing, he probably hoped to be able to get her to accept his terms. If he were truly as savvy as he seemed to be during the late Joffrey’s wedding, his terms had to be reasonable. Perhaps the dragon queen would send agents of her own.

 _A lot of people to trade Tywin’s life with._ It was not the many possibilities that haunted her nights and prevented her to sleep, of course. She hated it, of course, but Maester Rubben was right: _familiarity_ tied her hands. All these years spent with him had somehow led her to imagine her entire life at this exact place, just near Tywin and behind the throne. That _entire life_ only lasted four years. Accepting to surrender him also meant surrendering that certainty they had built their existence on. _The world will never be ours._ So the world would never be hers either.

Both the lack of sleep and these nagging thoughts sent her back to a dark place she thought she would never visit again, one she had spent most of the war against the dead in except that, this time, the whispering voice in her head also spoke of blood spilled and heads on pikes. The only solace she used to find were the answerless letters she sent to Jaime. It was a catharsis: in those letters she could say just how worried and scared she was. No one could see, no one could tell, not even the man who received these letters. She did not even remember what she wrote there, she just knew that it was the only way she had found not to implode. The fact that Jaime was there but mostly avoided her did not make the situation any better, this time.

He had taken Alec and Jon to the jousting fields, entertaining their absolute exultation to be surrounded by the incongruous amount of new knights and new Lords in the Red Keep. He had made sure, of course, not to cross her path on his way to their room. She had seen him from the top of the stairs, but if he noticed her presence he neither made any comment nor reacted. He just left with her sons and left her at the top of the stairs, on the highest floor of the Tower of the Hand.

Outside the Tower, the preparations for that tourney as well as for the grand dinner given that night made the Red Keep both strangely silent and extraordinarily busy. Most Lords were either preparing themselves or their relatives for the tourney, or just watching when they were too old for either of that two things, and most Ladies were preparing for dinner; only maids and valets roamed the castle, trying to get everything ready.

 _Only maids and valets,_ she thought as she was walking up the serpentine steps, _and me._ She had walked outside of her apartments to breath some air and stop herself from thinking too much. _As if it were that easy._ She had tried to find some peace of mind while walking the sunken courtyard but all she found there were empty stables and an eerie silence. It did not ease her mind nor changed anything to the nagging thoughts, of course, so she decided she might as well continue to work on the levy to impose to the first actual harvests since winter had arrived. She walked up the serpentine stairs, heading to the Tower of the Hand, and thoughtfully looked around. Her eyes then fell on the royal sept.

She had not stepped inside that place since Jaime found her here on her own, contemplating her own moral decaying. _If I had known,_ she mused, _what would soon happen to us._ She stopped there, near the Tower, staring at the small building. No sept had ever managed to sooth her mind – she had tried. But at least it was warmer inside and she would not have to pretend to be interested in levy and taxes. All she would find there would be silence, memories and silent promises she did not keep. Nothing to bring her peace of mind, quite the contrary, and yet she slowly headed toward the sept. She stopped in front of the door, hesitated for a few more seconds, and slowly entered.

Someone was inside, standing in the middle of the steps that led to the centre of the sept. She did not have time to discreetly leave; a gush of wind blew the door closed with a loud _BANG_ , causing the silhouette to practically jump and turn toward her. _Ser Garlan Tyrell,_ she recognized when he faced her by the shifting candlelight. It took him a few seconds to recognize her, but when he did, his face, once alerted, returned to its usual, composed self. He gracefully bent the neck to salute her, but his mind was not entirely there. She remained still, near the door.

“Forgive me, Ser,” she softly said once the echoing _bang_ quieted. “I did not mean to bother you.

\- This is your home more than it is mine, my Lady.” He shrugged. “You have every right to be here.

\- I am not certain this is anybody’s home.”

A thin smile appeared on his lips, quickly gone. He simply nodded and turned his back on her to look at the altars again. What he was doing here before she invaded was only too obvious: he was praying for his passed wife and their stillborn son. _Or is he?_ Most people whispered their prayers to the God they were talking to. He was just standing there, looking at them all silently.

Four years had passed since she had last seen him, for Joffrey’s wedding. From that time she remembered a joyous man, no less handsome than his younger brother but seemingly more interesting to speak with. She mostly remembered a man very much in love with his young wife. Lady Leonette herself was nothing in particular, but she was kind and witty enough to mock the terrible singers hired by Cersei Lannister.

The man she was looking at was but a shade of that memory. He was wearing a very dark green doublet, with no gold like the rest of his very proud family. That man was still mourning and, whatever his family’s plans could be and whether he knew about them or not, he did not try to hide it at all. He was there to every kind of festivities organized by his sister, but only physically. He did not dance, did not really talk, he just politely attended and remained until he was excused by his sister. It was a miserable thing to see, even for her, and she was about to leave when his voice echoed again.

“What did you come here for?

\- I am afraid,” she slowly said, unsure of the correct answer to that question. “That my answer is not the right one.

\- Ha.” He scoffed and looked at her again. “Leave it to Lady Lannister to be both truthful _and_ cryptic in one answer.

\- Would you prefer the absolute truthful answer, Ser?

\- Is that something you can do? Be absolutely truthful?”

She scoffed as well and nodded. _That was fair._ He gestured her to come closer and she slowly did, walking down the stairs until she found herself just next to him. Garlan Tyrell had fought at the Wall with his younger brother, and he had not returned unscarred. A long scar barred his face, from the right corner of his forehead to the left side of his chin, barely avoiding his eyes and particularly marked on his nose. The rumours spoke of an ice spear or an old sword; in any case, it was a cruel reminder of the horrors that happened in the North. The thick beard he was growing barely hid a third of it. She made sure not to stare, and instead looked at the altars in front of them.

“I came for the silence,” she eventually said. “And the loneliness.

\- Then I am ruining your moment, am I not?

\- You are taking my mind off many unpleasant things, so no, you are not.” A pause. “But I suppose I am ruining yours now.

\- I did not come for the silence and the loneliness. Those are two things I usually carry with me these days.

\- Did you not come here to pray, Ser?

\- What for?”

She looked at him again, surprised. There was a coldness to that answer, the kind of coldness she would not have expected from a Tyrell. _Especially from this one._ She remained quiet for a long time, observing him from where she stood. The coldness of his voice had reached his eyes, darkening their usual warm brown. He did not look like a mourning man: he looked vengeful and angry. _I suppose that is one of the stages of that process._ It just looked especially strange on a man like him.

 _Condolences are warranted in that kind of situation, are they not?_ She had already presented them, of course, through an official letter signed by her and Tywin – not that he cared. She did not even write it herself, she just signed it. They were all too busy celebrating the end of the war, when it happened. Selfishly, she did not give of her time to write a more thoughtful letter than the usual and official kind. _All the more reasons to speak them now._

“You must have been told that countless times already and it cannot mean much coming from me,” she slowly said. “But for what it is worth, you have my sympathies. 

\- She said you would say something along those lines.” He smirked mockingly and finally looked at her. “Margaery.

\- I am sure she did. She also warned you not to trust any kind of sentiment I would express, let alone any kind of sadness or worse, _tears,_ did she not?

\- Impressive.

\- Your sister was always smart, but most of what she knows of court scheming she has learned from me. She knows what to expect of me… And I of her.”

She shrugged. He scoffed and shook his head, looking like someone who wanted absolutely no part in that matter. _Rightly so._ She remained silent, knowing exactly where this conversation would go – or, rather, _how_ it could go. There were two possibilities, really; either Garlan Tyrell spoke of his deceased wife and stillborn son and that mention of his sister was simply a way to get her _not_ to try anything, or Margaery herself had commissioned her brother to approach her and try to win her over in a sideway manner. She did not think he was faking his mourning, but however low that strategy might be, it was not above his royal sister. _I would know. I probably would have done the same._

He climbed down the rest of the stairs until he was surrounded by the seven altars of the Seven Gods, with only her behind him. He looked at them all in turn, the Mother, the Maiden, the Smith and the rest of them. On his face, though, there was no visible expression, no emotion whatsoever. He was contemplating them with neither fear nor reverence, no comfort and no sadness. All she saw was a man admiring statues – that was all they were for her. The livings were more interesting to her than Gods of stone.

“May I ask you a question, my Lady?

\- You may, Ser. Do be careful, though, I feel surprisingly truthful today.

\- I was looking for another truthful answer.” He turned to face her. “Do you believe in the Gods, Lady Shara?

\- I hope you were not expecting some highly philosophical answer, because mine is a lot simpler,” she smiled. “I have no idea whether the Gods exist or not, or if they do exist in some ways we have not yet thought of. In any case, no, I do not believe in them in the way most people do.

\- How so?

\- If they do exist, they do not care about us. They do not listen to our prayers, they do not see the altars we build for them. Perhaps they carved us a fate, and that fate is a wicked one indeed, but it is all they ever did for us and all they will ever do.”

A thin smirk appeared on his lips. With another man she would have chosen her words more carefully, but given the turn this conversation was taking, she already knew what he was about to say. _That no God can exist in a world where a young and innocent woman can die of childbirth_. Did she not think the same thing, when faced with that possibility? It only confirmed something she already felt, of course, but she could conceive how lost someone who truly believed in the Gods could feel after that cruel realization. The fact that she survived and not that poor, sweet Lady Leonette Tyrell was another proof of the Gods’ wickedness. _That,_ she thought, _and the fact that I am discussing the matter with a widower as freely as I would discuss the weather._

“I asked my maester that same question,” she continued. “A few days before I gave birth to my sons.

\- I heard you nearly died. My sister wrote about a true miracle, in her letters.” His smirk turned bitter. “I suppose the Gods only have so many miracles in stock.

\- I count my blessings.” She took a deep breath, shrugging off the flashes of memory. “You asked that question for a reason, Ser. What was it?

\- For two reasons, actually. One I was mostly imposed and one I entirely chose,” he said, making a few steps toward the steps and, incidentally, toward her. “My sister told me you would probably try to manipulate me if I found myself alone with you. I figured that given the place and the appearances, you would try to pretend to believe in the Gods to pretend to understand my pain and the remedy the Gods can bring.

\- You do look in pain, Ser, but with all due respect I knew you were not here to pray as soon as I entered the sept so… _That_ would have been a foolish thing to do.” He shrugged. “What about the other reason, then?”

That conversation was taking an unexpected, if interesting, turn. She had known for quite some times that there were two kinds of Tyrells siblings; the shimmering fools and the beautiful cunning. It did not take that much of insightfulness to understand that while Margaery belonged to the second category, Loras belonged to the first. She had not enough spoken with Garlan during the wedding to decide whether he was a very well disguised fool or if he had a very subtle kind of cunning; then again, given how much he seemed to have changed since that time, he may have very well switched category.

It was clear now that although he seemed unwilling to take any part in his sister’s scheming, he knew and saw a lot. He was still not very subtle himself, given the heaviness of the trap he set for her, but he was better than what she imagined. _And that may very well play in my benefit,_ she thought, _considering that I have passed his trials._ Not that it was hard; but still. She had to play with his rules until his intentions became clear. 

“A very selfish desire to see if I was the only one who had lost faith in the Gods when their cruel design became obvious,” he replied after a few seconds of silence. “I would not say I am satisfied to see someone else going through a faith crisis, but…

\- I never had faith, Ser. Those last few years only confirmed something I already knew.” She smirked and shrugged. “You should not believe what they say about us Arryns.

\- Especially as there is not a lot of _you Arryns_ Perhaps I should have listened to what they say about Lannisters?

\- It depends what you wish to hear. Although I have to say that…” She paused and tilted her head. “For someone warned by his sister not to trust any of my words, you surely are very talkative.”

He chuckled sombrely and walked up the stairs until he returned to his initial place, just near her. Witnessing that scene with their empty eyes, the stone Gods looked back at them when they both lost themselves in their contemplation. It was truly marvelous to her that people could find solace in that kind of coldness – and it was even more incongruous when it came to the northern gods, those whose faces were carved on the weirwood trees. _Or maybe more people go to sept and godswood for the same reason as I do,_ she thought, _for the silence and the memories._

One thing was certain anyway: whatever the actual reason why Garlan Tyrell had come to that sept on his own, it had completely vanished and it had now been replaced by something a lot more secular. _So much for taking my minds off unpleasant things._ She patiently waited for him to word his intentions while staring at the Crone’s face. _Now that is an unpleasant sight as well._

“She fears you.” She turned her head to look at him, raising her brows. “She does. We have seen you get out of more desperate situations than this one. She would consider her plan flawless… If not for you.

\- Are you supposed to find a way to make me less of a threat?

\- Not officially, no. She would not dare ask this directly.” A cruel smirk appeared on his lips again. “Willas was supposed to come. She insisted for _me_ to come instead, under very careful crafted pretenses. I do not need to tell you why, you already know.

\- Marriage is a powerful weapon, when used smartly. I would know.

\- I suppose she hoped to sell me into marriage to that Targaryen girl herself. But you do seem to have derailed her plan, and I think she is considering you instead.” A scoff, even more bitter than his smile. “I could have become a king, and all it took was a conversation with you to return to my lame condition.”

_Do not speak of missed royal opportunities with me,_ she mused. She did not pretend to be surprised; of course she knew what his cunning sister would try to do with her widower of a brother. It was a nice touch, however, to know that she was feared by the little queen. In her desperate attempt to find a way to defeat everyone’s expectations, she had managed to defeat hers _and_ to upset her plans.

 _Although trying to tie my hands with a poor marriage to a second-born son is not worthy of her wit._ Given how panicked she had been since Jaime arrived and that entire masquerade had started, though, it made sense for Margaery Tyrell to come up with a very unbalanced offer: a desperate woman trying to protect both herself and her children would accept that kind of offer, and she did pretend to be that kind of desperate woman. It was a bit vexing, though, that it was _that_ convincing. _Or maybe it is the fact that, for a time, it was not pretending._

“What a poor choice of brother,” she sighed. “I could conceive the idea of marrying the heir, but the second son? I would bring a lot more to your house than you would bring to mine.

\- Except that this is not about dowry and usual politics, is it? This is about you surviving the war to come.

\- The Vale is worth a lot more than my life, Ser.” She eyed him. “I would not sell it off just to survive miserably.

\- Ouch.

\- No offense meant.” After a short silence, they both chuckled. “What about you, Ser? You are the only one involved who has not expressed his opinion on the matter.”

He rolled his eyes, making his opinion rather clear. His jaw tensed and he resumed his staring at the statues, mostly the Mother’s. _The very one who did not allow his wife to become one, and instead delivered her to the Stranger._ For once she did imitate him, out of both disinterest for the statue and the feeling that it was unwarranted, given that she was freely speaking of the possibility of her current husband being dead. _Murdered._ Betrayed. _Left for dead by none other than me._

That thought sent her all the way back to that dark place she had just barely escaped for a few moments. Somehow that place felt far worse now than it had felt during the war, and not only because she had no way to escape it; she felt cornered, now, by the two conflicting voices in her head that both commanded her to go and be done with _him_ and to _never ever think of such a thing._ The first won, obviously, because it always did. For all that, it did not silence the other one and it was especially loud now.

“In case it is not obvious enough, I absolutely loath the idea,” he groaned. “But I also know that both my sister and my father will hardly leave me another choice if they truly set their mind to it.

\- You do know, obviously, that as of now I am married? That conversation of ours…

\- Please, my Lady. If there is something that is absolutely certain in this war to come, it is the coming death of Tywin Lannister… Whoever kills him first.” She took the blow, trying not to let anything show. Garlan was not looking at her anyway. “That is the only certain thing in this disaster anyway.

\- Your father and sister are not trying to make things easier for me, Ser Garlan, and it is certainly not in your interest to do otherwise, especially if you despise the mere idea. So why are we discussing this?

\- This wedding is prince Doran’s doing, as you probably know. Apparently it was quite the negotiation to get the dragon queen _and_ my family not to orchestrate a proper invasion.” “You are the kind of woman to throw everything to the flames if you cannot get what you are looking for and I have had enough of wars… In a lifetime.

\- So you are saying this is a war effort you are making? Or, rather, a very literal peace offering?”

He shrugged. _Call it that way if you will._ She smiled and shook her head, almost in disbelief. That day had certainly taken a turn she had not expected, as well as that conversation and her relationship with both house Tyrell as a whole and Garlan Tyrell especially. _He is not the smartest man of the realm,_ she thought, remaining silent for the sake of his suspense, _but he certainly is a good man._ Margaery’s ghost was never too far away from her mind, though, and it was still possible that she was pulling his strings. With, or without, his consent and acknowledgement.

“Is it your sister I hear through you, Ser?

\- She would kill me if she knew I was making that kind of offer to you, when all she dreams of is compelling to accept a public humiliation.” _She can dream._ “Assist us from now on and help us ensure no one is killed, and we can find a mutually beneficial arrangement.

\- I know everything about that sort of arrangements, Ser Garlan, and I know that you cannot keep that promise on your own.

\- It is up to you to convince those who can,” he said, sighting. He looked at the nearest window. “Should you not get ready for tonight’s dinner?”

She interpreted the question as the end of that conversation. She nodded with a smile and climbed the stairs back to the main doors. She stopped there, a few steps away, and looked behind one last time. Garlan was still looking at the altars and she could have sworn she saw his shoulders sag, if only a bit. She was not the only one considering treason – at least that was how he saw it. At least she was already dead and he had taken no part in her demise. She gulped, took a deep breath and walked toward the door. She only paused long enough to speak one last time.

“As much in your interests as well as mine, this should not reach your sister’s ears.

\- We have only discussed our faith in the Gods, my Lady.

\- Even that should remain unknown to her.” She closed her eyes, already certain the rather dense Garlan Tyrell would not listen. “But you will do as you see fit, as long as you are willing to endure the consequences.”

She stepped out and winced when the usual icy wind hit her face. She hurried back to the Tower of the Hand without looking back, knowing full well that someone might see her walk out… And him afterward. If anything, he had the most to lose in being indiscreet with this royal sister; she had absolutely nothing not more to lose than what was already on the table. _Let us see,_ she thought as she climbed the stairs to her apartment. _She could throw a scene publicly and accuse me of trying to woo a widower._ That would compel her to reveal _why_ Shara Lannister would do such a thing, thus revealing at least part of her treason. Once at her landing, she eyed Tywin’s door. _She could speak to him directly._ What for? That would be a declaration of war and she was not brave enough to face him yet. _She could send him back to Highgarden,_ wasting an opportunity to control her when the time would come.

She could organize some clever trap for them to fall in, of course, but it would hurt him, not her. As she heard Tywin’s voice through his door and opened hers, she even figured it might awaken him to what she could do to him. Part of her hated that idea, given how much power he could still use to stop her and, effectively, destroying every opportunity to get out alive of the coming war; another part, though, the one that could not quite be silenced, hoped he would see what she was doing.

What for, though, was a question that voice did not answer.


	7. Things are looking up...

The tourney ended with Garlan Tyrell’s victory, to absolutely no one’s surprise. Most of the truly talented knights did not attend that tourney, anyway, and those who did had lost most of their lustre during the war against the dead. _As well as some limbs, which does not help at all I suppose._ Garlan Tyrell won for lack of better contestants, really, and it was very adequate anyway that the queen’s brother won.

With the tourney’s end came the festivities’ end as well. The victory dinner was also the last of the grand dinners organized by the queen, but it was also the greatest. The entire court was invited inside the throne room to feast and dance in the honour of the _happy victor_. Given the colours that covered the entire room, however, it was clear that the honoured victor was not just one man.

For once she was seated at the same table as Jaime, but that did not change anything to his muteness. He just sat, two seats away from her – her sons’ seats. It was one of the two boys’ first official dinner. They looked especially smart in their matching red and gold doublet, but they were mostly bored to death by how long it lasted. Given that Jaime was no less bored, he tried his best to keep Alec and Jon busy but really there was no use. Things would certainly get a bit livelier when the dances would begin but the atmosphere was strangely… _Silent._ As if everyone here knew what this meant, and knew that they were celebrating the end of an era.

 _The end of something we know,_ she thought bitterly, _for something we cannot possibly fathom to begin._ Choosing an unknown monster instead of one they knew; the sort of gamble she never found interesting in the first place. Given that she was the monster they were replacing, she liked it even less.

The musicians arrived after a while, but at first their music was soft, barely audible over the echoing voices and conversations. She did not notice them at first. She really only noticed them when she saw one of Margaery’s Lady-in-waiting – _Lady Carolina xxx Florent,_ whisper something in the ear of one of them. He looked surprised, asked for a confirmation, and eventually nodded. He exchanged a few words with the other musicians while the girl returned to her mistress. The queen gave her a delicious smile and rose on her feet. Everyone quieted, including the musicians.

“My good Ladies and Lords,” she declared with a bright smile. “Thank you for attending this dinner. To see so many of you assembled in this one room, filling it entirely with your laughter and your smiles, is such a moving and humbling sight.” Shara distinctively heard Jaime scoff, and saw Tywin’s fist clench on the table. “Of course you know that we are here to honour the winner of our tourney, my beloved brother. Please, Garlan, come!”

Said _beloved brother_ rose on his feet and joined her with a bright smile. Now that she knew his sentiment about his sister’s schemes, it was painfully obvious that it was both forced, fixed and that he probably wished to be anywhere else. He did embrace her, though, and gracefully bowed in front of the entire room. One Lady started to applaude and the rest followed, including, of course, Alec and Jon who were only too happy that _something_ finally happened. She politely clapped as well, but Tywin did not make a single move. _Classic._ Aggressive, but classic.

“We are also here to celebrate the kind of love that makes the upcoming wedding possible: true, deep and pure love.” Some ladies swooned. _The gods be merciful, get to your point._ “The last war has been particularly unkind and wicked, of course, and I feel that we have all somehow forgot what love means and what love looks like.” Margaery looked right at Shara, through the table and the room. She did not react, at least not visibly, but her mind instantly understood that something was about to happen. _The consequences of the sept’s conversation._ “It is high time it returns, and so, with the victor-of-the-day’s permission, I would like to organize something that, hopefully, will trigger even more weddings. What do you say, Garlan?

\- I say, sweet sister, that you will is my command.” He looked confused, despite his still very much fixed smile. “After all, you are our queen.

\- My very polite brother is perplexed.” Some courtiers laughed. “Enough suspense! The dances will soon begin, but I will design our couples myself. I see many unmarried Ladies and unmarried Lords who could make lovely dancing partners on a short term… And maybe more in a longer term?”

More laughter echoed. Garlan went through a variety of emotions – failure to understand in what convoluted way this had anything to do with him, slow realization, anger, frustration and, finally, when he turned to look at her through the room as well, regrets and anger again, but this time against himself. She slowly rested her back against her chair, already certain that she would be the first to be called forth. She spared him a _I told you so_ look and simply waited for her moment.

Her entire table was blissfully unaware of what was happening. Jaime seemed to try to disappear into his seat, in case the queen had a plan for him, while the two boys were openly wondering if they would dance too. She was not listening, not really; she was looking at Margaery Tyrell, still standing, a look of pure happiness on his face… But her eyes frozen solid like two blocks of ice were now fixed on her. _Is that really your declaration of war?_ A dance? She was not expecting a lot from House Tyrell when it came to openly admitting their treason but that was unexpected… In its absolute ludicrousness.

“I simply have to begin by my beloved brother, do I not?” she continued, turning to him. Her eyes melted like ice in the sun, until they were back to their usual lovely selves. “What do you think of…” A long silence, pretending to be wondering _who_ she could pick, looking around until she looked at her. “Ha, I think I have just the one. Lady Shara, would you dance with my brother?

\- I believe you mentioned unmarried Ladies and unmarried Lords, your majesty.” She tilted her head, carefully avoiding Tywin’s eyes. “Or maybe the rules have changed?

\- They are my rules, are they not?” She clapped in her hands and turned to Tywin. “Lord Hand, would you allow it?

\- My Lady wife will do as she wishes.

\- It is settled, then! Musicians, play for our couple of honour while I pick the rest of our couples.”

Shara rose from her seat and exchanged one look with Tywin Lannister. If he was upset, or angered, or frustrated, he let nothing show; it was too soon for him to ask questions. This was unexpected for anyone but her and Garlan and he had no knowledge of any reason why Margaery Tyrell would suddenly wish to create a new couple with his wife and her widower of a brother. _That will come,_ she thought as she turned away without a word. _And maybe he will see what he blinded himself to._ Whatever happened tonight, in the throne room, the night would not be over when the dances would be. Maybe that was better this way; maybe Margaery Tyrell would succeed in creating the perfect conditions for her surrender without conditions, or maybe she would step out of the Hand’s room stronger than ever before.

But for now, she had to dance with stupid Garlan Tyrell and she had to make it look like a believable story. _She has done that for herself, but that does not mean it cannot also work in my favour._ She joined him in the middle of the room, just near the musician, in the empty square created by the tables around. He offered his hand, she took it and music started.

It was no surprise for her to observe that Ser Garlan Tyrell was a good dancer – like his younger brother and sister. For as long as they were alone in the middle of the throne room, they remained absolutely silent; her smiling for everyone to see, him simply keeping on his fixed smile. It was not long before other newly formed couples joined them, though, and only then did he drop his act to look at her straight in the eyes.

“You do not need to say it,” he hissed, his voice mostly covered by the music. “I know.

\- I was not about to. What did you tell her?

\- I simply mentioned that I had seen you in the sept.” His jaw tensed. “She did not even seem that interested when the conversation happened.

\- You did say she is obsessed with me, did you not? That should not surprise you. She is playing with the weapons only she owns against what she probably considers a direct attack.” She shrugged. “Although I have to admit I had not thought of that weapon.”

She eyed her table when it was in sight. Jaime was staring at her, visibly mocking; Tywin was too. He had not missed the few words they had just exchanged and he now looked… _Fuming?_ His hand on the table was not drumming, but his fingers would have if she had been alone. He could very well be as blind as she had been, or he could very well _not_ consider her a threat against his life, but he could not ignore that something was afoot right under his eyes.

That angry shine in his eyes, one she had not seen in years, fueled the darkest part of her mind and reminded her of another war. _Do be angry, my Lord,_ she thought, now smiling cruelly as they eyes met. _I am playing the game again._ He now looked exactly as he had in his room, four years ago, as she slowly but steadily crossed the line and let him flip the coin. Angry but absolutely aware that there was nothing he could do now, nothing to stop her.

“It does not have any sense,” Garlan whispered again, tearing her away from her memories. “How can a dance be a weapon?

\- The dance is just a spectacle, and she is making a spectacle of _us._ ” She twirled with the rest of the dancers, her back now turned on her table – and Tywin. “In doing so, she is burning my bridges.

\- What bridges?

\- Is there truly a brain inside that pretty head of yours, or are you just faking it most of the time?” She frowned when she was certain neither the queen nor the Hand could see her. “My bridges to my husband. She wanted me humiliated, did she not? This is the first step.”

She barely looked at him; she waited for the moment when she would be able to look at Tywin again. When it was finally possible, she smiled again and stared right at him from across the room as she music slowed down and turned into a slow waltz. Now was no longer the time to discuss the queen’s plan, but it was the perfect moment to defy Lord Tywin Lannister. And defy she did.

On his side of the table, Jaime was no longer smiling mockingly either. He was just staring, his eyes just as cold as they usually were when he was in the same room as her. For once, she cared less about them than she cared about his father’s – but it meant something, of course. Either Jaime had realized something bigger was happening… _Or maybe he just remembered that we did waltz, once, at the top of the world._

Feeling intoxicated by the two men’s reactions, she did not see Tywin leaving with the two boys; but she did see him coming back, and remaining on his feet behind the table. _Stop that at once,_ he commanded. _Make me,_ she replied silently.

“A pause!” the queen suddenly declared, stopping both the musicians and the dancer who all turned to her. “I call for a pause… And for a toast, if your Lady and Lordship would be so kind as to take the glasses you are given.” Maids and valets rushed with plates covered with glasses, themselves filled with sparkling wine. She thanked Ser Garlan when he handed her one and rose it with the rest of the room. “To love, may it always light your faces the way it does tonight.

\- To love,” the room replied in a single voice. From the corner of her eyes, she saw Tywin refusing a glass.

\- And to a new era, starting from now and lasting for centuries. May the couples here light the path of changes.

\- To a new era.”

She only mouthed the words when Tywin looked back at her, raising her glass even higher. She sipped it and put it back on a plate as soon as the musicians resumed their song. Garlan was about to leave her when his sister urged him to resume his dance as well. Shara took his hand again and tilted her head, smirking darkly now. _She had it all prepared so well,_ she thought. _This is all too easy for her._ Almost pathetic, in a way, to see her resort to such low ways. The full meaning of his words only evaded the weak of minds, the babes and the deafened crones; for the rest of the court as well as the invited nobles, it was all too clear.

Hence the number of eyes staring at them. The two Lannister men were no longer the only ones observing that strange couple spinning, whirling and swinging, seemingly unfazed by the sudden attention. That was only true in appearance of course, and even then Ser Garlan was not too good at hiding his discomfort and loathing of the situation. She just smiled and enjoyed the tumultuous daze she was lost in while it lasted. This was a spectacle; for as long as it lasted, it had to remain so.

And she was looking too, the little queen with her little schemes, but she was not satisfied: the spectacle was too long and it went too well. Even her little speech had little to no effect on Shara. She was supposed to dance, and thus she danced. _If only you knew what usually happen when I dance._ She wondered if she would ever know that part. If anyone would know. _Oh everyone will know._ If she had to fall, she would fall with the certainty that everyone would know what happened when Shara Lannister danced.

_Not that I plan to fall anytime soon._

“Your sister may be smart,” she voiced lowly enough not to be heard by the rest of the dancers. “But it seems that her subtlety is as good as gone.

\- Did I not tell you she fears you?

\- Only a fool would let _fear_ darken their mind.

\- Is that the reason why you keep on smiling so brightly? Because you do not let _fear_ control you?

\- I fear not your royal sister, Ser Garlan.

\- What about your illustrious husband?”

She scoffed, Garlan Tyrell did not. He was absolutely serious, and he was seriously considering the possibility that she might fear her husband. _It is what I told Margaery,_ she remembered. _But it was not him I pretended to fear._ Just the fate he offered her. Tywin Lannister could have hurt her, a long time ago, but that time was long gone now. The idle threats he uttered sometimes were just that: idle threats. They were like an old tune they were both used to, one they sometimes sung to.

As for physical threats… That was never his preferred form of threats anyway. He did threaten to have her killed, but he never even suggested that _he_ could kill her, or wound her. He had other ways to be terrifying and more than enough money to pay others to dirty their hands.

She twirled around when the music commanded her to and she chuckled, high enough to be heard around – and visibly enough for her _illustrious husband_ to see. He was whispering something into Jaime’s ear now, and although he was very ardently maintaining his cold composure, the man was burning, fuming, _smouldering_ with anger. The music was not nearly over, though, so there was nothing anyone could do to stop her now.

“What a good question,” she finally said when other dancers shielded them from both the queen and the Hand. “Why do you not answer it yourself?

\- Everyone fears Tywin Lannister. For good reasons.

\- And you often openly plot someone you fear’s death, right under his nose, with his own wife?

\- I have very little qualm,” he retorted, frowning. “When that very wife is also openly plotting that man’s death.

\- And yet I am not. I am considering my options, Ser, and one of my options is you once your family has killed my husband.” The son was nearing its end and she could see Jaime walking toward her, weaving through the crowd of dancers. “Considering your sister’s frenzy, though, it remains to be proven that you can actually get him killed without destroying yourself in the process.”

She separated from him and curtsied with the rest of the dancers. It was not the first time, of course, but this time Jaime appeared between the two of them before music even started again and before Garlan could take her hand again. She could no longer see him, and she could not see Jaime’s face either given that he faced him, thus turning his back on her. She remained still, posed and composed, while he asked to have the _chance_ to _steal_ only one dance to her _royally appointed_ dance partner. _His wits are rusted from all the years he spent holed up in Casterly Rock,_ she thought as Garlan gracefully accepted, even joking that she had exhausted him and he did need a pause.

A pause he took with his queen, of course – he had a lot to tell her, or maybe a lot to blame her for. She barely looked at them and absentmindedly took Jaime’s hand when the music resumed. The change of mood could not have escaped anyone; he was not looking at her and she was not looking at him. Her mind was elsewhere, later in the night already. That was just the antechamber, and like Tywin’s antechamber four years ago, this was absolutely empty and useless.

 _You are your own trump card,_ she thought, absorbed with her own thoughts, dancing without really thinking. _And everyone’s wild card._ That was the plan, was it not? If she could play that part well enough and keep on casting doubts in everyone’s mind… If she could remain the centrepiece of the game, and keep the music going for long enough… _There is nothing anyone can do to stop me._ She simply had to accept the idea of negotiating with everyone, whoever could be in Dorne when they…

“I know not what game you think you are playing, Shara,” Jaime spoke. “But you are on a thin line above dancing flames.

\- Is that not adequate, given what is to come?

\- So this is that great plan of yours? Angering everyone and hoping to find some way out before one of them gets tired of your fluttering around?” She looked up at him, finally, and saw that he was staring at her. “What even is this farce you are playing with Garlan Tyrell?

\- I wonder, is it you speaking or your father?”

His face hardened even more. Looking at him from where she stood made her mind snap back to the present and to the truth of their position. _When have you last stood this close to him?_ She had that voice quiet. It spoke only too loudly and she did not need this kind of whining and regrets at that moment. She ignored the very piercing pain she felt when he looked away with only coldness and judgment in his emerald eyes and smiled to the nearest Lady who was clearly fixing her gaze on them. _Now is absolutely not the time to let anything show. The night is not over yet._ Neither was the music.

“Did you conceive this foolish plan of yours as a form of twisted vengeance?” he asked, never answering her question. “Because it surely looks like it.

\- Do not flatter yourself, I have better things to do than fomenting a very complex scheme all around you.” She rolled her eyes. “You are not the centre of my world.

\- Oh, I know you are both your own world and the centre of it. I have known for four years now.” A pause in the music, and thus a graceful pose for all the dancers, including them. Jaime hissed near her ear. “Do not make me choose between you and my father.

\- Like you would make that kind of choice and not just run away at the first opportunity. Plus…” The music resumed, separating them again for a few seconds. “When faced with an alternative, I know that, to you, any other choice is better than me.”

_You did choose to hide away in a glorified cave at the other end of the continent, after all._ She did not feel as angry and frustrated and sad and hurt as she had a few days before, when she had faced him again for the first time in four years: she was too focused to allow herself that kind of distraction. Jaime did take the blow, though, and looked away for as long as he possibly could. _This is not important tonight,_ she repeated herself. _I can deal with that, with him, later._ Now was not the time for regrets and things left unsaid, and letters left unanswered and probably unread.

The song was nearing its end and she smiled again, brighter than ever. Most people would not see through it but it was certainly too bright to be trusted – no matter. When things shine hard enough they also blind those who do not know what to really look at. The king’s court was a pile of elaborate blinds who would not tell basic truth from lies.

“You should smile, Ser Jaime,” she finally said when the dance ended. “Have you not heard Her majesty? A new era is dawning tonight.

\- We can only hope to be part of it.

\- We already are.” She let him stiffly kiss her hand and made one step toward him for that he could hear her whispers. “Just you wait.

\- You are reckless. Think of…

\- Lady wife?”

The two of them turned to look at Tywin Lannister’s incongruous presence amongst the dancers. She tilted her head with a smile, Jaime looked down for a second. Everyone around seemed to hold their breath, the most foolish in the hope of seeing _Tywin Lannister dance,_ the most reasonable in the fear that he might end it all with a single word. Garlan and Margaery Tyrell were looking from afar, their faces unreadable. The silence that had fallen with his sudden coming was deafening, heavy and unusual. _And the music ended the way it was always bound to end,_ she mused. _With this one man, alone in a cheerful crowd._

“Your sons demand you,” he slowly voiced. His voice was unshaken, as his face. His eyes were the darkest they had ever been. “In their chambers.

\- Then who am I to refuse them my presence?” She turned toward the queen and curtsied deeply. “Would you excuse me, your majesty, and allow me to leave?

\- Of course. There are some duties more important than anything else,” she deliciously said, looking more innocent than ever. “Do kiss your sweetlings for me, my dear friend.

\- I will. Ser Garlan, thank you for tonight. It was most pleasing.

\- As it was for me.”

They exchanged a long glance and she turned away, heading toward one of the doors that led to the inner courtyard and to the Tower of the Hand. Tywin was not following, not just yet, but she knew that Alec and Jon were already sleeping. _End of the music,_ she thought, _and now the actual dance begin._


	8. ... But soon they will take us down

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hi everyone! Thanks a lot for your kind comments and kudos - it's really heartwarming to see that this (originally) little fic still interests so many people. As always, don't hesitate to leave comments, they really motivate me and I *love* to see what your predictions are.
> 
> This chapter should begin to answer your questions (and raise others, of course). Enjoy!

As she expected, Alec and Jon were already sleeping soundly when she arrived in their room. The candles were still lit, but given how much they had burned already, they would either be quickly replaced or they would just die down. She remained in the doorway for a few seconds before closing the door again and slowly heading up the stairs, one step at a time. She felt strangely calm as she went into her room where her maid was awaiting her. She let her undo her hair, untie her dress and wipe off the rouge on her face. Once the girl gone, she slipped into her nightgown and into a crimson, velvet robe. She eyed herself in the mirror, never used to the reflection she found in the mirror when her hair was down and there was really nothing else than the simplest version of herself to look at. _This is supposed to be who I really are,_ she thought distantly. _But somehow it feels like this is who I am the least._ That blond, virginal, innocent young woman, almost still a girl, was not her.

And it was especially not the version of herself that was needed tonight, but this one would have to make do. She tied her robe’s belt around her waist and left her room when she heard Tywin’s door close. She walked past her guards, past his guards, through his antechamber, until she reached his chambers proper. She entered without knocking.

He was putting away parchments at his desk, his back turned on her. Obviously he heard her; if he did not, then he heard the door clacking shut when she softly pushed it closed. He would remain silent, of course, keeping her in waiting as she had kept him waiting during the dances. She walked to one of the window, the one that overlooked the inner courtyard near the bed. Ladies and Lords were starting to leave the throne room and return to their apartments. _Her majesty’s grand night ends quite soon,_ she mused while Tywin took off his Brocard coat behind her, seemingly uncaring of her presence nearby. She looked behind her shoulder for a second while he slowly untied his leather doublet. That too he seemed not to see. _That man will not spare me anything._ She rolled her eyes, shed one last look outside before she turned to face him, her back against the cold window.

“If you have something to say,” he eventually worded, his voice as unshaken as ever. “You may say it now. I have a lot of things to do tomorrow and a lot of things to prepare for His majesty’s journey.

\- Is it not a bit late to engage in such foolishness, then? Why do you not spare us the ordeal, and get to the point?

\- What point?

\- Seven Hells,” she hissed. Still he was not looking at her. “Alec and Jon were sleeping soundly, as I expected them. You had me leave the throne room for no speakable reason, but a reason we both know all the same. I will not apologize.

\- Apologize for what?”

_This is…_ Infuriating. Frustrating, unbearably so. This should not have surprised her; this was not the first time Tywin was playing daft to get what he wanted. But she was not expecting _that_ reaction at _that_ moment. _He looked furious,_ she thought. _Feverish._ Now he sounded absolutely disinterested in the conversation and _cold_ , like nothing had happened and it was not entirely faked. _But his anger was not at all. He hated what he saw._

He put down his doublet on the back of the nearest chair and finally turned to look back at her. And he looked just as cold and disinterested as he sounded. His eyes were just green, their usual green, not the black pyres they were when he was angry. It was disarming and it made absolutely no sense. She frowned and shook her head, now properly maddened by his silence and lack of reaction.

“If that is a convoluted and low way of punishing…

\- Maybe it is you who should spare us this ordeal you are putting us through. You speak nonsense.

\- Enough!” she cried. “Do I not deserve better than this? After all I did for you, and all you tried to do to me?

\- Come now. What has the Tyrell boy gotten into your mind?”

_There we are._ She forced herself to smirk, seemingly victorious, but somehow she knew it could not hide the true amount of anger she felt – all the anger, and frustration, and questioning, and doubts and qualms that had been piling up since her conversation with Maester Rubben. He must have seen it, or at least guessed it, since he smirked as well and slowly shook his head. He did not seem to particularly enjoy this moment. He just seemed… Strangely both surprised and not at all. _Like he was expecting it to happen, but not like this._

So he knew, then, but _what_ he knew exactly remained unclear. She remained by the window, and they remained separated by the bed and the dressing table. A poor shield, really, to the kind of attacks they would throw at each other. _It is still entirely possible,_ she thought, _that by the end of that conversation all the king’s horses and all the king’s men will not be able to shield myself from him any longer._ She tightened her robe’s vest around her waist and eventually shrugged.

“If you are speaking of Garlan Tyrell,” she slowly said. “That man has more air than brain inside his skull, so there is hardly anything he can get inside my mind. 

\- And yet you made quite the scene of that dance of yours. Enlighten me, what have you done to enrage our queen to the point that she found that ludicrous idea of making you dance with her brother in front of the entire court?

\- I suppose I made too much of an advancement regarding my own schemes. It derailed hers and she took fright.” She smirked again – more genuinely, this time. “Thus the dance.

\- Making your lies true, or so she hoped.” A pause. He was not smirking anymore. “Is that what you were expecting me to do? Do what she hoped for, and perhaps burn our bridges?”

_Yes._ No. _No?_ She shrugged again in silence. He remained still for a few more seconds, then gestured her to sit on the edge of the bed. While she slowly did so, he opened a small cabinet and took off two crystal glasses. He filled them both with a Dornish strongwine – the bottles had come with the invitations to Myrcella and Trystane’s wedding. Given the colour of the label, it was clearly destined to the Tyrells. She could not help smirking. _Better safe than sorry, when it comes to snakes._ She took the cup he offered her and watched him turn the chair that usually faced the dressing table so that he could sit on front of her.

And he did. There was nothing left between the two of them, except maybe a few inches betwixt their knees. He stared at his drink, thoughtful, for a long time. The tension in the room had somehow lessened, now that the cards were all laid out on the table. The tension in her shoulders, though, was all the more painful. Too many conflicting voices in her head urged her to do as many conflicting things. Apologize, scream, beg, mock, keep quiet or speak – Tywin’s absolute lack of reaction did not help her choose. She was not prepared to face a quiet man.

“That must be terribly frustrating to you,” he finally said, raising his eyes and looking at her. “To realize that you cannot get away with this the way you always have.” A pause. “Uncompromisingly victorious, with everything you want in the end the exact way you wanted it all.

\- ­Untouched, unbent and unbroken, to quote my future hosts?” They exchanged a smirk. “I may still get exactly what I want. What happened tonight is a proof of that.

\- And I am sure you will, but not without sacrificing something or someone in the process.” He sipped his glass and leaded unto the back of his chair. “Let us review the things you might sacrifice, shall we? Beginning with the inanest thing you could sacrifice, yourself.

\- Why would it be inane?

\- Your existence does not matter enough for you to gain anything in simply offering your life,” he replied in a conversational tone, as if he were not freely speaking of her own sacrifice. “And once dead you cannot possibly ensure that whoever you bargained with will respect whatever you bargained for. In that process you would endanger your children, your house, your legacy and obliterate your pride. I am sure it did not even cross your mind as a conceivable sacrifice.”

_It surely did not,_ she did not say. She just chuckled and sipped her glass. He remained just as stony-face as ever and just stared right at her. Even by the weak candlelight, she could tell he was not improvising, or just realizing something. This was all very clear in his mind. _Glad to know I am not the only one here who got an epiphany._ She remained silent, because deep inside she already knew where he was leading her and how this would end. That quiet conversation, seemingly innocent and casual, was a disturbing thing to witness. Full and blowing anger would have been easier to deal with than the slow progress toward one thing, and one thing only.

“You could also choose to sacrifice your children. You could refuse to negotiate with anyone and decide to fight to the bitter end, until dragons come and burn you and your sons alive, as well as most of those who might be foolish enough to follow you into a losing war.” Another pause. “Your pride would be safe, your legacy mostly intact and history would remember you a woman so inflexible that she chose death for herself and her own children rather than compromising.

\- Do you truly think I would do such a thing?

\- I never thought so. It is now clear that you will not, considering that you are actually negotiating,” he noted. “But I can name one or two of your kin who could have done that sort of thing, so it was worth considering.

\- Is that not how Eddard Stark is remembered? So inflexible that he chose death for himself and his entire family?” She smirked. He just sipped his wine. “There is no use in safeguarding a legacy if there is no one left to pass on the story.”

_Two possible sacrifices._ Not the smartest, and not those she really considered anyway. The thoughts had haunted her at night, of course, that she could both offer her life or not offer anything at all – but these were thoughts that came when sleep deprivation rendered her semi-mad, at the first hours of the day. Not only was it _inane_ , as Tywin said, but it was also unconceivable. A world in which she was not alive anymore was not a world worth fighting for, let alone _dying._ She almost considered the second option slightly less ludicrous than the first: at least in this one she could more fates than just hers.

“Moving on to the _things_ you could sacrifice, and not just the people, you could decide to sell it all off.” His tone was getting darker, because he was also reaching the end of that conversation. “Squander every bit of your power against survival and, possibly, leftovers of influence. Forsake your rights to every land but the Vale, give away each of the darkest secrets you know and bend the knee to whoever ask you to.” _The soft voice._ “You and your children would be safe. Your house would survive and endure, possibly to rise again in years or decades.

\- In the meantime, though,” she slowly retorted. “It would all but disappear, just as my legacy would collapse. All I have done until now would be for naught.

\- Your pride would not survive it, indeed, and you neither. You were never selfless enough to gamble so much for something you will never get to see.” A dark smile. “But you did consider this one a lot more thoroughly. You do still consider it, do you not?

\- Sometimes, yes.”

_In the middle of the night, when I am at the deepest low but still conscious enough to see just how desperate I am to even consider it._ More and more she imagined that possibility as Jaime’s words, on the highest floor of the Moon Tower – he told her of a possibility of a quiet life, as high as she could go before she burned, _you never tried,_ he said, _maybe you could._ She could negotiate that sort of thing, after all. But she would not survive it long enough to see the hopes that came with that kind of all-encompassing sacrifice. Living on her knees for the rest of her existence, always begging for survival and forgiveness… _No. Never._

She frowned and tensed again, her hands tightly knitted around her glass. Tywin noticed that, of course, and his smile turned into an even darker grin for a mere second. Because he was right about her feelings about that plan, of course, but also because now was the time for the point she both dreaded and awaited. The bridges – burnt or standing strong. She took a deep breath and looked back at him, still as a statue, her voice quieter than she thought.

“You have mentioned most of the stakes,” she said before he could continue. “My life, my house, my legacy, my pride, my children, all these things I can sacrifice in order to salvage the rest. You have failed to mention yourself. Where do you stand in all this?

\- You know exactly where I stand. I stand amongst the things you can sacrifice, but hardly amongst those you can salvage.” He put his glass on the dressing table nearby and when he looked at her again, she saw flames dancing in his eyes. Cold flames. “And I am the last sacrifice you can decide to make.

\- I cannot offer your life in exchange for anything. You would not let me, and I have no way to compel you.

\- You would be unwise to try,” he commented. “But you can do exactly as you have done tonight. Not voicing any strong opposition against, and perhaps even quietly encourage, schemes that all come down to one thing and one thing only.

\- Your demise.”

He nodded. So did she. _A long time ago we talked about my death, and how he had every bit of control over my survival._ The tables had not turned, obviously, because she had absolutely no measure of control over his life – but how things had changed. She put down her glass as well, on the chest just near her feet at the end of the bed. Still this was not going the way she had expected. She had imagined every possibility: a screaming fury, violence, or cold anger if he realized it soon enough; the silence that came after realizing it is too late, if it took him too long. No reaction at all, if it happened while she was not there.

Never had she imagined that this could happen like this. She was not surprised to understand that he knew all along, and that he had been expecting that much probably even before Jaime’s arrival forced him to admit what was happening. _Then I was right,_ she thought, _from the beginning._ The one reason he did not tell her before was because he knew she would eventually come to see how much of a leverage he could be. She had just imagined in a darker, more resentful way that it truly was. And it is what truly left her frozen still, unable to voice any other word that the last one, _demise_ : how distantly he spoke of the prospect of her betraying him in the end. And how upset it made her, like a distorted mirror.

He must have seen that to, or at least part of it, because he scoffed sombrely and rose on his feet again. He headed to the window she had left and remained there, his back turned on her, admiring the last of the guests as they left the throne room.

“Did you think I forgot our conversation when we started this Dance of yours?” he asked after a while. “The only reason why you did not instantly do as Varys told you is because you had a way to flip the wheel upside down and hopefully remain as powerful as you would ever be for a few more years. Had that dead boy and the dragon queen met when we spoke, you would have chosen the obviously winning side as soon as possible. Such is the way you play the game, and I have not forgotten.

\- Why did you allow it, then, and why are you sending me alone to Dorne despite knowing that I may choose to play against you?

\- Because there is hardly anything you can do that can directly put my life at more risk than it is now.” He scoffed again, cruelly. “I know you love to think of yourself as the deadliest piece on the board, but now that there are three dragons involved, you have clearly been degraded to just another schemer. The only thing you can do is place bets against me and hope to collect them.

\- And even that does not bother you?”

It was a cruel irony that she was only starting to understand why Tywin Lannister had been so distant and evasive these last few weeks, possibly months. Why, after returning alive from the war against the dead, he remained not only haunted by what he saw in the North, but also silently obsessed with what was coming from the East; he had never forgotten that she could have chosen differently from the start, and that her staying was not an act of loyalty but a last-chance gamble that she had lost the very day she had won.

 _It is what he expected._ But it was not nearly as easy as he seemed to think, was it? It took Maester Rubben, and Garlan Tyrell, and countless sleepless nights to accept something he had fully embraced the day he gave her controls of his agents in Essos: that it would end one day, and that she would do what could be expected from her. _Change side until I can stay on the winning one._

But if it were so obvious to him, why did he was so furious in the throne room? So fuming, so eager to stop something he was not even surprised to see happening?

“I have known you for what you are for quite some times now. You have betrayed one king to join a winning side once, no matter how many sacred things you had to forsake and destroy in that process. I had no reason to hope you would not do it again when the time came.” A silent pause. He turned his head to look at her again. “But does it bother _you_?

\- What if it did?” she retorted. He did not react, but he did look taken aback. “Would it be so ludicrous a thing?

\- Then I would admit that this surprises me a lot more than you scattering your chances everywhere you can. Why does it bother you?

\- I did not betray a king and forsook and destroyed the Gods know how many sacred things just because I wanted an easy win. I was willing to fight to the bitter end to get the victory I wanted, not just any.” _At first, anyway. Things… Changed along the lines._ “This has hurt me more than you can imagine, and still hurt me to this day.

\- And now you are afraid of what my ghost could do to you.”

She shook her head. She was not afraid of ghosts: she had a lot of them looming over her, whispering at her ears and reminding her of all the terrible things she had done. She was used to them now. She was afraid of how hard it felt to do _what he expected her to do_ , and she had been afraid of what a slighted and threatened _living_ Tywin Lannister could do to her. Now she was starting to understand that that was not going to happen.

And yet there were so many things he could do… And one in particular that could destroy all hopes for her to negotiate her way out of the fray. Only one man in the entire world knew exactly what she had done to House Targaryen; only one man knew that it was her doing and her doing only. All it could take was a letter with a few undisputable evidence and it would be over. Perhaps she could not directly endanger his life, but she could not stop him either if he decided to reveal it all. _But it is not going to happen, is it?_

“And you will let it all happen,” she murmured. “In Dorne, where you willingly send me, when you have all the weapons in hand to stop me.

\- Why would I want to do that?” The question was serious; it was not mockery. “Why would I want to annihilate the little progress you have made and the victory you will surely negotiate?

\- Because we are talking about _betrayal_.” Her voice was slightly strangled when she finally spoke the one word that summed it all up. “My betrayal, of you. Because you are Tywin Lannister and you answer betrayal with the Rains of Castamere. Because none of what you are saying makes any sense since the beginning of that conversation. Because you should already have threatened me and revealed…

\- You think you know everyone’s move in advance, Shara, but you seem to have overlooked one thing,” he spoke, and his calm was all the more infuriating. “You may choose to play against me, but you will always play for House Lannister.”

Long seconds passed before the full meaning of that very simple sentence hit her. She slowly rose on her feet without realizing, her breath stuck in her throat as she faced both Tywin Lannister and the entire truth of their circumstances for the first time. _He is not just my sacrifice._ She slowly shook her head, both in disbelief and in a pitiful attempt of self-persuasion that he did not mean what she understood. _This is not just my doing._ She had been stupid for thinking for one second that this man could allow himself to become someone else’s pawn, even hers, especially hers; and she had been stupid for thinking she could stop being his key-piece on the board. And she had been blind, again and again, over and over again, for not seeing that this was all a very carefully paved road she was walking.

House Lannister would endure, its legacy, its pride, its children, its lands, as Tywin Lannister always wanted it to. It would keep shining and holding the dices, at least some of them, exactly the way he always wanted it to. _Everyone’s wild card,_ she thought. _And his trump card._

_This is him choosing who gets to live and who gets to die._

“How can you be certain I will not stop playing for House Lannister?

\- Because you will not. Your snow-capped mountains, your white castle piercing the skies, your green fields and your strongholds will never be enough for you.” A smile. Secretive. “Otherwise you would already be gone.

\- And if I want to keep fighting for you, and not just for our house?

\- You will not either. You have stopped doing that the very day you spoke to Garlan Tyrell for the first time.”

_Him again._ It brought her back to the throne room, and to Tywin’s burning eyes, the two never ending dark pyres that could have swallowed him whole. The pyres that should have tried, once again, to stop her, and destroy her, the way they had four years ago. Instead, those two pyres did nothing to her; they _allowed_. Witnessed. Kept quiet. And it was both unsatisfying, unsettling, and it left her with the hollow and eerie feeling of… Being undone. Things should not have happened that way, not then, not _ever_ , not with the fire she had seen in his eyes all evening long.

The same kind of pyre she allowed to be swallowed by four years ago when she crossed the line. _If I have been doing exactly as he planned,_ she asked herself again, _why was Tywin Lannister so furious to see it happening?_ How was that evening in the throne room different from all the lonely evenings he allowed her to spend in her room, or wherever, with whoever she wanted?

It was visible, of course, by everyone. But those who had any common sense had already understood that a war was about to begin, and that it would pit the Lannisters against the Tyrells; those who had the smallest knowledge of court and the last wars knew that she was hard to place. The rest of the court probably saw two young people dancing, regardless of their houses and their allegiance. That evening had not changed anything, not in the long run. Margaery’s plan had failed in every aspect of it. Shara Lannister had shone in her brother’s arms, Tywin Lannister had not said a word and…

 _He did not say a word._ She had shone in another man’s arms, and he had not said a word. _Could a sentiment so vile make him so furious?_ He was not above that. Underneath the plotting, the wars, the infighting and the sacrifices they were both making at that very moment, Tywin Lannister was a man. She was right to think that she would have to face him slighted and angered, because that was exactly what his voice hardly veiled when he uttered Garlan Tyrell’s name. Blinded by the stakes, her own fear and doubts, she simply had seen that as signs of her own treachery; not of his own shortcomings. _So quick to think everything is about me,_ she thought, _about me and about the dreadful things I do,_ when really she was the only one hearing the voices in her head blaming her for them.

So quick to thing everything was about the things she was doing, but it was really about the things _he_ could not do in public.

“That leaves one question open,” she slowly worded, making one more step toward him. “If all of that was entirely planned in your mind, and if I am just doing your bidding without you even having to ask.

\- What question?

\- My first question, in fact.” She smirked again, holding unto that vile reason why his eyes were burning in the throne room to regain her composure and shrug off the painful truth she refused to face just now. “Why did you get me here?”


	9. A last shred of truth

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hi everyone! Just a quick PSA: this chapter *should* please those of you who are Shara x Tywin diehard - but just to be sure, this chapter will display explicit, consensual sex.
> 
> I must admit this chapter as well as the one just before are my favourite to date. What about you? ;)

“Your sons demanded you.

\- They did not. They were sleeping soundly when I found them,” she retorted, slowly shaking her head. “No one demanded me here, or anywhere. Except for you.

\- You did not seem unpleased to leave. If anything, you seemed quite anxious to have that conversation of ours.” He frowned. “If you have nothing to complain about, complain not.

\- You are right, I was quite anxious indeed and things did not go… As I imagined, which brings to reconsider a few of the things I thought obvious.”

She took a deep breath and shrugged when he frowned even deeper. His demeanour had changed, though, and she could see hints of his anger back in the throne room, as well as frustration that she was digging deeper into that anger. _His turn, now._ She had felt that frustration long enough tonight. She tilted her head, faking thoughtfulness, smirking to herself. She decidedly did not wish to think about what had just been said, and _this_ was a lot more interesting to think of… _And act on, probably._

“I knew that was going to be a conversation between the two of us, a conversation I both dreaded and looked forward,” she spoke, separating each word. “One where you would have to face that you do not control me.” She scoffed. “I was a fool for thinking I was not doing exactly what you wanted me to… But I saw that anger in your eyes, however misinterpreted.

\- You saw what you wanted to see.

\- Yes I did. I thought I was seeing rage against me, but that was not the case. That rage was directed against someone else, someone you could not stop without risking to throw your own plan overboard.” A pause. “Garlan Tyrell.

\- You are tired.

\- And you are angry again, because I just put my finger on the right spot.”

He stared at her, trying to stare _down_ but she stared back, still smiling. They remained like that for a long time, long enough for her to see the subtle change in his stance. At first it was just increasing annoyance, a silent way to order her to stop whatever she was trying to do, then the slow understanding that she would not stop until she got exactly what she was after. Then came a few instants of wondering what he could do to win this after all… And the idea.

Only then did a cold and calculating smirk appeared on his lips too, as he made one step toward her. She rose an eyebrow, watching the scene unfold. _That_ , she had expected. It _was_ jealousy, and the only thing he could do to keep her quiet without admitting… Was silencing her. There were more ways than just one to do that, and he chose exactly the one she imagined – the one she had encouraged, poking at the flames and waiting for a flashback to burn her.

“Come now,” she purred, chuckling. “Do you not have better things to think about than crude, low _jealousy?_ Do you truly think Garlan Tyrell has what it takes to hold my interest for more than a second?

\- No, but he does.” Another step forward. She made a step back. “However brooding he might be, he believes there is a chance that you might accept that ludicrous and degrading offer he made you for another reason than your mere survival.

\- Does he, now?” His eyes were shining again and she only saw them now. The rest of the room was gone – there were just those two hypnotizing emeralds in front of her. “Do you read minds?

\- I know men and I know how they behave with things they covet.” Another step forward, another step back. “That man held you like he had a chance to do it again.

\- Perhaps he will. You are giving me free rein, for better and for worse. You let me bet against you… Who is to tell I will wait to enjoy my very likely soon regained freedom from you?”

Words had escaped her mouth without her thinking and she instantly regretted them when Tywin’s entire demeanour darkened. All was fair until it was just speaking of opportunities seized and bets placed – she had just spoken of death. _His_ death. _For much for keeping that thought at bay,_ she thought as she made one last step back and hit the side of the bed. There was no more going back now: she had spoken her mind without wanting to, and she had triggered this. _To keep the thoughts away._

When he grabbed her throat and squeezed it enough for her to gasp, she also understood that she had done this to satisfy her own mind. She had been expecting violence, and threats, and screams to match the incongruous guilt she felt when she plotted _against him_. He had not served her that violence then, but he could do that now, under other pretenses. She smirked even wider and grabbed his wrist with her two hands. He leaned over her and whispered, his voice strained with _that_ anger.

“You are not free.

\- Is that what you wished to tell him?” she retorted, refraining from wincing. His grip was strong, painful. “To tell the entire court? That I am not free?

\- No.” He made another step, and no inch was left between them. One more step and they would fall unto the bed, pressed together as they were now. She tried to gulp against his grasp. “I should not have to tell them.

\- So to show, then.” She released his hand and slightly rose her chin, as much as she possibly could. “How would you have shown them?”

One second of pure, suspended silence. One last second of rational thinking on both of their parts. One last glance, and he had plunged into her neck, exactly what he used to hold her throat, and she was gasping for air, unable to determine whether it was because he had just released her or because he was _devouring_ her. She could not tell if he was biting, kissing, bruising or caressing – it was both painful and exquisite, and she did not realize that his hands were now fumbling with her robe’s belt.

Not until he untied it and tore the whole cloth away, that is. She smirked and, with less haste and more ease, pulled the lace that kept his shirt tied until it opened on his chest. She put her hands there, underneath the open shirt, and tried to push him away. One of his arms instantly circled her waist to keep her still _and_ close. Knowing that he could not see her, she closed her eyes and bit her lips not to give him the all too early satisfaction to hear her panting already.

“Was that what you were looking for?” she heard him growl near her ear while he took off his own shirt. “A storm to replace the one you did not face?

\- I still do not believe it is not coming.

\- Oh but it is.” A low chuckle, his hand slithering down her waist to her hips and thigh, then where her nightgown ended just above her knee. “Believe me, it is.”

She did not have enough time to think of a reply; she was already lying on the bed, right in front of him still standing. All it took was a soft push – after all, she had placed herself there, the back of her legs against the mattress. _I was not inclined to make it easy to you when I entered that room,_ she thought as she sat up to face him. _I am not more now._ She slipped out of her nightgown before he could join her on the bed, just to see him struggle to keep his eyes in hers. It did not last; he did keep them up for a few seconds, only to try to crawl on top of her. She let him, just enough for him to be all over her, and she flipped him down, her two hands on his chest to keep him lying. His was on her waist, ready to end this as soon as he wanted to. The only reason he did not end it now was because she was untying his breeches and effectively stripping him.

These last four years had taken a toll on him, more so than they had on her. He had not turned into a frail old man – of course not, but the general impression his body used to give that he was younger than his years was now gone. None of his strength was gone, but the few battle scars he had collected through the years seemed a lot more visible on his paler skin. The gold of his hair was entirely gone. There were signs of that on his general appearance, for those who knew how to look, but it was the first time in a long time that she got to see what he looked like underneath the armour and the doublet.

Sensing that that realization might break the spell and clear her very comfortably clouded mind, she threw away the breeches and sat on his upper thigh, just behind the now very visible bulge in his pants. She smirked and placed her hand over it, softly pressing that bulge. It twitched under her fingers as he frowned and tried to rise. She pushed his chest down with her remaining hand and slightly leaned over him. He frowned even deeper, groaning.

“I thought I was allowed to play the game just how I want,” she purred, pressing his hardness a bit further. “Or maybe this was not part of the game you had in mind?

\- Are you not clever?” His eyes flashed, dark again, and he slipped his hand between them, until he reached the junction of her thighs. One of his fingers, seemingly inadvertently, brushed that most sensitive part. She could not suppress a shiver, and he obviously noticed it. “Two can play that game.

\- You are not patient enough.

\- And as always you talk too much.”

He darted up and knocked her over, one of her wrists pinned against the bed. She struggled against his grip, as much for the sake of it as because she had a very precise idea in mind, and he tightened it. That would leave a mark – _that is the point._ She gasped when the brushing of his fingers turned to stroking and arched her back without really wanting to. He let out a low chuckle that sounded more like a snarl and he pushed both harder and deeper inside of her.

If she had let him do as he pleased, it would quickly be very satisfying, as it always was. She always eventually forsook and yielded, but tonight it was not just about _being satisfying._ She fought against herself not to simply tear off his pants and give in to the growing waves of pleasure he was already sending up to her stomach. She slipped her hand inside of his pants, or tried to anyway – he was not close enough and the clothing was in the way. He realized that, and paused when she tilted her head with a wry smile.

“This,” she said, pulling the rim of his pants. “Is in my way.”

He narrowed his eyes and remained still for a few seconds. He probably knew that this night was not like other nights, and that doing what she implied would be playing her game, but whether it was curiosity or obscured judgment, he let go of her wrist to untie and take off his last remaining piece of cloth. She barely waited for him to be done, and grabbed _his_ wrists to pin _him_ down again, putting all her weight against him. He stared at her with hungry and voracious eyes, allowing her to push as hard as she could and hold as tight as possible.

She could feel his hardness against her thigh as they defied each other in silence. She had to let go of his hands to satisfy the very demanding warmness between her legs as well as his own, but she would not release him until she was certain he was not going to win this just now. It was another kind of war, and she could hardly remain focused with the _yearning_ she could not quiet, but she only loosened his grip after very long seconds. He did not make a single move, his eyes glaring at her as she slowly let go to sit on his groin again, simply giving her enough space to take his manhood in hand and pleasure it. He instantly tensed under her and sent one of his hand to grab her waist again, while the other one ran along the lines of her stomach. He could not reach her breasts just yet, but she felt nails digging into her waist’s skin.

“Why must everything be a battle with you?

\- You should be happy, you are getting exactly what you wanted.” she breathed, rising herself. “You freed me from all bonds, gave me permission and blessing to destroy you…” She did not look away from him as she slowly lower herself on him. She bit her lips not to moan when he delved inside of her. The nails dug deeper. “But I am here tonight.”

_Unfreed_. She took him whole after a few seconds and let out a soft whine. He was fighting against himself not to indulge her as well, she could feel how tense he was. _No matter. I am more patient that he is._ Leaning slightly over his chest for support, she started to rock against him, up and down, very slowly at first. Had he not been clearly hypnotized by what he was looking at, he probably would have thrashed a lot harder against her – instead, one of his hand trailed up her chest to reach her breast and cup it, press it, clutch it. She had another shiver but she never looked away from his eyes, even when they lost themselves on every inch of her naked body undulating over, against him.

That would not last, but for these few suspended instants, almost silent and out of time, she felt insanely powerful. If this was a storm, the storm she had been expected, then this was the eye of the hurricane. She had felt the first gash of winds, and the pulsing pain around her neck was a proof, but for a moment, there was quiet, and for a moment she had won everything. She smiled, widely, _madly_ , and when he looked up and saw that grin on her face, that moment ended like a rubberband snapping back together.

His face darkened, not just his eyes but his entire face, and he sat up, enough to be able to face her. Their faces were just a breath away, their lips were touching. She held back her breath without thinking, bracing herself for the tempest or another kind of quiet. When his hand on her waist ran up her back and grabbed the hair at the back of her head, yanking it backward, she understood that they had just left the eye of the hurricane. She cried and gasped, especially when bite stings joined the pulsing pain of her bruising throat.

“You’re _mine_ ,” he growled when his biting reaching her ear. “Now and ever.”

She could not reply, not anything but a weak moan as he pushed her back, taking back control over everything and thrusting inside her a lot harder than she had allowed him until then. Holding her down by the throat, he covered every inch of her exposed skin with an indefinite mix of kisses, bites, scratch, caresses – with a dreadful and heavenly mix of torture and devotion. She could hardly tell the pain from the pleasure and her moaning and whimpering from his snarls of anger, pleasure and lust. That heady and intoxicating mix was so terribly on par with the clouds and the dilemmas and the conflicting feelings in her mind, so exactly the physical reflection of the torture she put herself through, that somehow the hurt was what drove her to the edge the quickest. The pleasure she was used to; the pain irradiating from every part of her body was new and _exactly what she needed._

She desperately clung unto him, forgetting entirely the intense feeling of power she had felt only moments before, and she encircled his legs with hers to accompany his ever more violent thrusts. Moaning turned to crying, crying turned to begging for _more, more, more_ , more pain and more pleasure, more torture and more violence, more _everything_ , until they reached the crest of that battle they were leading. Abandoning all else, he leaned over her, against her, and held her tighter than ever before as they felt the last and greatest wave of pleasure washing over them, wringing ragged shouts of pleasure from the both of them.

He bore down on her for a few instants, not nearly enough for them to catch their breath and come around, before he rolled next to her. She kept her eyes close for a very long time, feeling her senses returning in waves. The pain, surprisingly, was not the first thing to return – the cold was. The fire in the hearth must have died, or maybe it had never been lighted, and now that there was not another body to cover hers she could feel the icy draughts whistling through the room. It sent a shiver through her entire body.

That was when she realized Tywin was just near her, and that their arms touched. The mattress moved, shifted. Sounds returned with the rustling of clothes moved around, and she opened her eyes when she felt sheets covering her. He was seating there, tearing the bed covers and ruining the careful work of his servants. _We are upside down on the bed,_ she realized. She could not help smiling for a second. _Then_ pain returned as well, when she turned to face him once he had laid down under the covers. She winced and as surely as he had felt her shivers, he saw the grimace. This time, though, he just looked back at her, his face unreadable again. His breathing was still irregular, sometimes to deep and sometimes too shallow.

She tried to find something to say, something bright or some witticism, but she found nothing. Her mind was clear again, but it was also cleared; she could not think of anything. All the conflicts and the internal fighting were gone with each of the bruises that stung or burned her now. Physical pain had, once again, washed away the hurting thoughts that plagues her brain and her nights. That he was the one to inflict that pain upon her, of all people, not only made it better, but it made it _good_. It was a sort of twisted revenge: if he would not punish her for what she was getting ready to do to him in Dorne, then he could punish her in another way.

She was wondering if he felt the same way when he softly reached for her cheek to graze it lightly. _He cannot hurt me for doing what he has been expecting me to do all along,_ she thought. _So he hurts me for another reason._ He did not look guilty. He did not look particularly proud either.

“The things you make me do,” he just said. His voice was hoarse. “Just to feel better about yourself.

\- I did not make you do anything.

\- You did not stop me.

\- Why would have I?”

He did not say anything. He was about to take back his hand when she stopped him, and took it in hers. Their joined hands rested between them, closing that little space that separated them. _He has aged,_ she thought as they silently looked back at each other. _He truly is the Old Lion now._ She did not feel any older than she felt four years ago, when they had truly shared that bed for the first time. By all standards she was still young; some women were not wed at her age. Most of them, after most sons died in the war against the dead. The only scars those four years left were those of her pregnancy – marks on her stomach, those that did not vanish. Invisible scars _inside_ her stomach, that made her a still young but barren woman. Years had not touched anything else. _Just him._

“It is not like you to loathe your own actions that much,” he spoke again. “And to accept retribution so easily.

\- Just because you do not see or understand something does not mean it does not exist.

\- I know you. I know what you do and why you do it. That…” He looked down at their hands, thoughtful. “Is not you.

\- I wished it were true. But you did not do your task properly, did you?” She smiled humourlessly. “You never flipped the coin entirely. There are still sparks, voices of the other side plaguing my mind, like the voices of your side used to plague me.

\- And those voices are pleading for me?” A scoff, just as humourless as her smile. “They either are very cynical or really not the wisest of your voices, then.”

She scoffed with him, keenly aware of the ridicule of the situation. She was not expecting understanding from him, when it came to those conflicting voices and the qualms she was feeling. That was not something Tywin Lannister could understand – having _qualms_ was not something he could understand, and picturing her having them was not any more possible. He had never witnessed those times, at night or late in the evening, when the horridness of the things she had done suddenly became unbearable. He had never heard her doubting, regretting, _questioning_ her own choices. No one had, really. _No one but one man who now despises me because questioning those choices never stopped me from making them._

“You have not mentioned the possibility,” she slowly said. “That I could find a way to protect everything, including you.

\- Given that you have no dragons of your own and that all your wits cannot convince the dragon queen and her lackeys to return to their deserted lands, I would not call that a possibility.

\- So what, then?” She frowned. “You cannot just accept your death.

\- And I have not. I have not sacrificed myself and I will not until there is absolutely nothing else to sacrifice.

\- Who am I kidding? You are not the martyr type and there are still plenty of people to kill before it comes to you.”

He smirked and his eyes gleamed, ever so slightly. She wondered what an unhinged Tywin Lannister could do to save his own life. She was taking care of the rest – all the rest, his house, his sons, his legacy, all of that by playing against him if need be. She also wondered how many people would die because of that. _A lot._ Too many, by any standards. _Not enough, if it cannot protect him._ Sending her to Dorne was not just a way to send a wild card to negotiate, it was also a way to shield his own preparations for the war that would happen no matter what she negotiated.

She slowly sat up and crawl to the side of the bed to blow the last lighted candles off. When she was about to blow the last one off, she glimpsed herself in the dressing table’s mirror. Her neck was bruising already, as well as her shoulders and arms. She imagined that the rest of her chest was in accord. _None of that will show,_ she thought. _Except for my throat, maybe._ She could hide it, obviously, but should she? She was playing an act with the Tyrells. These looked like bruises caused by an angered husband and a cornered man. If anything, letting them show would serve her cause.

“The Tyrells will love that,” he said, also staring at the marks. “What story did you sell them?

\- A rather confusing one.” She laid down again, on her side. It was now too dark to see him, but she was looking in his direction. “Margaery says she does not believe it, but I think my “desperate mother and slighted woman” act did manage to get her to doubt. Surely that will help,” she noted, looking at her own arm. “My conversation with her brother panicked her, or so it seems. Garlan thinks I can spare him another war, if he offers me good enough conditions. Not that he can do anything on his own.

\- What is he asking for, in return?

\- Cooperation in the war against you, I suppose.” A pause. “If you really are planning to set things up while I am in Dorne, perhaps you should give me some bits to feed them with. That will go straight to the Targaryen girl’s ears.”

He nodded. It was all a bit ridiculous, was it not? Whatever he may set up, whatever trap he may conceive and whatever wrong information she may convey, in the end none of that could change anything to the fact that there were three dragons involved. As soon as they reached Westeros, none of that careful plotting and scheming and lying would matter. _But this is about gaining time,_ she thought. _For us both._

He reached for her face again, and cupped her cheek in her hand for a few seconds. He leaned unto his touch, unto the unusual warmth of that gesture. They remained like that for long seconds, enough for her to wonder if they were going to fall asleep like this, upside down on his bed, close enough to feel each other’s breath. She would have, really, exhausted as she was now, if he had not spoken one last time in a calm yet severe voice.

“When you are in Dorne, Shara, remember two things. One, mercy comes with a price.” His hands vanished in the dark. “Two, ruthlessness is mercy upon ourselves.”

_And your life is not mine to have mercy for,_ she understood. _And mine is the only thing I should have mercy for._ She nodded in silence, unsure whether he could see her or not. Ruthlessness it would be, then, and the only kind of mercy she would have would be for herself.


End file.
